that some of the most commonly used medications in medicine were originally plant-derived. The foxglove plant, for example, yielded digitalis, which has been a medical mainstay in the treatment of congestive heart failure and heart rhythm disturbances. Other common medicines used today that were derived from plants include psyllium, senna, atropine, morphine, scopolamine, and numerous others. For much of this century, merchants of “natural” health products and practitioners of alternative therapies