{"id":391,"date":"2022-07-31T16:51:40","date_gmt":"2022-07-31T16:51:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/travel\/the-tree-that-changed-the-world-map\/"},"modified":"2022-07-31T16:51:41","modified_gmt":"2022-07-31T16:51:41","slug":"the-tree-that-changed-the-world-map","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/travel\/the-tree-that-changed-the-world-map\/","title":{"rendered":"The tree that changed the world map"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n
Culture & Identity<\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0<\/span><\/a>Covid-19<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The tree that changed the world map<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

(Image credit: Celso Roldan\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

<\/picture><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n

Deep in the Andean rainforest, the bark from an endangered tree once cured malaria and powered the British Empire. Now, its derivatives are at the centre of a worldwide debate.<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Where to see the rare cinchona tree<\/h3>\n\n
\n
\n

Man\u00fa National Park<\/a>, Peru<\/strong>: A haven of biodiversity, the Unesco nature preserve is home to an estimated 5,000 plant species. <\/p>\n

Podocarpus National Park<\/a>, Ecuador<\/strong>: One of the last places to spot Ecuador\u2019s national tree. Hiking through its misty trails, you may also encounter the spectacled bear, one of the Andes\u2019 most emblematic animals.<\/p>\n

Cutervo National Park<\/a>, Peru<\/strong>: Peru\u2019s oldest protected area is famous for its pre-Columbian archaeological remains, 88 species of orchids and for being the last remaining cloud forest in the Peruvian highlands.<\/p>\n

Semilla Bendita Botanical Garden<\/a>, Peru<\/strong>: This botanical garden operated by local environmentalists is home to more than 1,300 native species \u2013 including orchids and cinchonas.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Unfurling in a carpet of green where the Andes and Amazon basin meet in south-western Peru, Man\u00fa National Park<\/a> is one of the most biodiverse corners of the planet: a lush, 1.5-million hectare Unesco-inscribed nature reserve wrapped in mist, covered in a chaos of vines and largely untouched by humans.<\/p>\n

But if you hack your way through the rainforest\u2019s dense jungle, cross its rushing rivers and avoid the jaguars and pumas, you may see one of the few remaining specimens of the endangered cinchona <\/em>officinalis <\/em>tree. To the untrained eye, the thin, 15m-tall tree may blend into the thicketed maze. But the flowering plant, which is native to the Andean foothills, has inspired many myths and shaped human history for centuries.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis may not be a well-known tree,\u201d said Nataly Canales, who grew up in the Peruvian Amazonian region of Madre de Dios. \u201cYet, a compound extracted from this plant has saved millions of lives in human history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, Canales is a biologist at the\u00a0Natural History Museum of Denmark<\/a> who is tracing the genetic history of cinchona. As she explained, it was the bark of this rare tree that gave the world quinine, the world\u2019s first anti-malarial drug. And while the discovery of quinine was welcomed by the world with both excitement and suspicion hundreds of years ago, in recent weeks, this tree\u2019s medical derivatives have been at the centre of another heated global debate<\/a>. <\/strong>Synthetic versions of quinine \u2013 such as chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine \u2013 have been touted and largely disputed as possible treatments for the novel coronavirus.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"Peru's<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

Peru’s lush Man\u00fa National Park is one of the last places on Earth where you can see the endangered cinchona tree (Credit: RPBMedia\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

For centuries, malaria, a disease caused by a mosquito-borne parasite, has plagued people across the world. It ravaged<\/a> the Roman Empire; it killed between 150 to 300 million people<\/a> in the 20th Century; and, according to the World Health Organization<\/a>, nearly half of the world\u2019s population still lives in areas where the disease is transmitted.<\/p>\n

Medieval remedies to cure \u201cmal aria<\/em>\u201d (\u201cbad air\u201d in Italian) reflected the erroneous belief that it was an airborne disease and ranged from bloodletting to limb amputations to cutting a hole in the skull. But in the 17th Century, the first known cure for it was allegedly found here, deep in the Andes.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"The<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

The world’s first anti-malarial drug was extracted from the bark of this tree \u2013 a discovery that has changed the world map (Credit: Celso Roldan\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

According to legend, quinine was discovered as a malaria cure in 1631 when the Countess of Cinchona, a Spanish noblewoman married to the viceroy of Peru, fell ill with a high fever and severe chills \u2013 the classic symptoms of malaria. Desperate to heal her, the viceroy gave his wife a concoction prepared by Jesuit priests made with the bark of an Andean tree and mixed with clove and rose-leaf syrups and other dried plants. The countess soon recovered and the miraculous plant that cured her was named \u201ccinchona\u201d in her honour. Today, it\u2019s the national tree of Peru and Ecuador.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Most historians now dispute this tale, but as with many legends, parts of it are true. Quinine, an alkaloid compound found in cinchona\u2019s bark, can indeed kill the parasite that causes malaria. But it wasn\u2019t discovered by Spanish Jesuits.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuinine was already known to the Quechua, the Ca\u00f1ari and the Chim\u00fa indigenous peoples that inhabited modern-day Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador before the arrival of the Spanish,\u201d said Canales. \u201cThey were the ones that introduced the bark to Spanish Jesuits.\u201d The Jesuits crushed the cinnamon-coloured bark into a thick, bitter powder that could be easily digested. The concoction came to be known as \u201cJesuits Powder\u201d, and soon, people across Europe began writing about a \u201cmiraculous\u201d malaria remedy discovered in the jungles of the New World. By the 1640s, Jesuits had established trade routes to transport cinchona bark throughout Europe.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"Though<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

Though Spanish Jesuits are often credited with discovering quinine, indigenous communities knew of it long before Europeans arrived (Credit: ajiravan\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

In France, quinine was used to cure intermittent fevers of France\u2019s King Louis XIV at the court of Versailles. In Rome, the powder was tested by the Pope\u2019s private physician and distributed for free by the Jesuit priests to the public. But in Protestant England, the drug was met with some scepticism, as some doctors labelled the Catholic-promoted concoction a \u201cpapal poison\u201d. Oliver Cromwell allegedly died of malarial complications after refusing \u201cJesuit Powder\u201d. Nevertheless, by 1677, cinchona bark was first listed by the Royal College of Physicians in its London Pharmacopoeia as an official medicine used by English physicians to treat patients.<\/p>\n

You may also be interested in:<\/strong>
\u2022 The indigenous communities that predicted Covid-19<\/a>
\u2022 How the humble potato changed the world<\/a>
\u2022 A 60,000-year-old cure for depression<\/a><\/p>\n

To fuel their cinchona craze, Europeans hired locals to find the precious \u201cfever tree\u201d in the rainforest, scrape its bark with a machete and take it to cargo ships awaiting in Peruvian ports. Increased demand for cinchona quickly led the Spanish to declare the Andes \u201cthe pharmacy of the world\u201d, and as Canales explained, the cinchona tree soon become scarce.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"As<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

As Europeans hired locals to harvest more quinine to fuel their colonial pursuits, cinchona trees became increasingly scarce (Credit: Universal History Archive\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Cinchona\u2019s value soared during the 19th Century, when malaria was one of the greatest threats faced by European troops deployed in overseas colonies. According to Dr Rohan Deb Roy, author of Malarial Subjects<\/a>, obtaining adequate supplies of quinine became a strategic advantage in the race for global domination, and cinchona bark turned into one of the world\u2019s hottest commodities.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

\u201cEuropean soldiers engaged in colonial wars frequently died of malaria,\u201d said Deb Roy. \u201cDrugs like quinine enabled soldiers to survive in tropical colonies and win wars.\u201d<\/p>\n

As he explains, cinchona was especially used by the Dutch in Indonesia; by the French in Algeria; and most famously, by the British in India, Jamaica and across South-East Asia and West Africa. In fact, between 1848 and 1861, the British government spent the equivalent of \u00a36.4m each year importing cinchona bark to store for its colonial troops. As a result, quinine is frequently cited by historians<\/a> as one of the major \u201ctools of imperialism\u201d that powered the British Empire.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"The<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

The British government invested a fortune in cinchona bark to produce enough quinine to ward off malaria in its overseas colonies (Credit: Dizzy\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

\u201cMuch like countries today are rushing to get to a Covid-19 vaccine to get a competitive advantage, countries back then rushed to get quinine\u201d explained Patricia Schlagenhauf, a professor of travel medicine at the University of Zurich specialising in malaria.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

It wasn\u2019t just cinchona bark that was valuable. Its seeds become a high-demand commodity too. \u201cBritish and Dutch governments wanted to plant cinchona in their own colonies to stop their dependence on South America,\u201d Deb Roy explained. But choosing the right seed wasn\u2019t easy. Each of the 23 species of cinchona has a different quinine content. It was thanks to locals with indigenous botanical knowledge that Europeans could secure quinine-rich species to export abroad.<\/p>\n

By the mid-1850s, the British had successfully established \u201cfever tree\u201d plantations in southern India, where malaria was rampant. Soon, British authorities started distributing locally harvested quinine to soldiers and civil servants. It\u2019s long been rumoured that they allegedly mixed gin with their quinine to make it more palatable, thus inventing the first tonic water and the famous gin and tonic drink. Today, small amounts of quinine are still found in tonic water. But as Kim Walker, who co-authored the book Just the Tonic points out, this British origin story is likely a myth. \u201cIt seems like they added whatever was handy\u201d \u2013 be it rum, brandy or arrack, she explained.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"In<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

In the mid-1850s, the British established “fever tree” plantations in southern India, where malaria was rampant (Credit: Hulton Deutsch\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Plus, as Schlagenhauf adds, quinine has a short lifespan in the body so sipping on a gin and tonic at cocktail hour would not be enough to guarantee protection against malaria. Nevertheless, the myth of gin and tonic as a potent anti-malaria prevention tricked even Winston Churchill, who allegedly said the drink had saved \u201cmore Englishmen\u2019s lives, and minds, than all the doctors in the Empire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, the gin and tonic is just one drink tied to the \u201cfever tree\u201d. Today, the most famous cocktail in Peru may be the American-invented pisco sour, but the most popular among Peruvians is arguably the bitter, quinine-flavoured pisco tonic, a homegrown invention that\u2019s often mixed with maiz morado<\/em> (purple corn) from the Andes to make a pisco morada tonic. If you\u2019ve ever sipped liqueurs like Campari, Pimm\u2019s or the French aperitif Lillet (a key ingredient in James Bond\u2019s famous Vesper martini), you\u2019ve tasted quinine. It\u2019s also found in Scotland\u2019s \u201cother\u201d national drink, Irn-Bru, and in what is reported to be Queen Elizabeth II\u2019s favourite drink, gin and Dubonnet \u2013 an aperitif which, coincidentally, was invented by a French chemist to make quinine more palatable for French troops stationed in North African colonies.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"Just<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

Just as the British drank gin and tonic to avoid malaria in their colonies, French troops in North Africa sipped quinine-rich Dubonnet (Credit: Christophel Fine Art)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Quinine was eventually pushed aside in the 1970s by artemisinin, a drug derived from the sweet wormwood plant, as the world\u2019s go-to malaria remedy. Still, the legacy of quinine runs deep around the world. Today, Ban-dung, Indonesia, is known as \u201cThe Paris of Java\u201d because the Dutch transformed this once-sleepy port into the world\u2019s largest quinine centre, brimming with Art Deco buildings, ballrooms and hotels. English is widely spoken in places as diverse as India, Hong Kong, Sierra Leone, Kenya and coastal Sri Lanka; and French in Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria today partly because of quinine. And in Spanish, there is still an expression that states, \u201cser m\u00e1s malo que la quina<\/em>\u201d \u2013 which roughly translates as, \u201cto be worse than quinine\u201d, a reference to the bark\u2019s bitter taste.<\/p>\n

At the height of the global \u201cquinine hunt\u201d in the 1850s, Peru and Bolivia both established monopolies over their highly lucrative tree bark exports. In fact, much of La Paz\u2019s Neoclassical cathedral and many of the cobblestone streets running through the city\u2019s plaza-filled historic centre today were built with cinchona bark, which at one point accounted for 15% of Bolivia\u2019s total tax revenue.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"Today,<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

Today, many of the streets in the historic centre of La Paz \u2013 as well as its striking cathedral\u00a0\u2013 were built with money from cinchona bark (Credit: rchphoto\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

However, the centuries-long demand for cinchona bark has left a visible scar on its native habitat. In 1805, explorers<\/a> documented 25,000 cinchona trees in the Ecuadorean Andes. The same area, now part of the Podocarpus National Park<\/a>, counts just 29 trees.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

Canales explained that the removal of quinine-rich species from the Andes has changed the genetic structure of cinchona plants, reducing their ability to evolve and change. Part of Canales\u2019 work, in collaboration with the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew<\/a> outside London, is to look at old cinchona bark specimens preserved in museums to study how human behaviour may have altered the plant. \u201cWe think that cinchona may have evolved to contain less quinine because of overharvesting,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n

Recently, the World Health Organization halted studies<\/a> of quinine\u2019s synthetic descendant, hydroxychloroquine, as a possible coronavirus treatment amid safety concerns. Despite the fact that the drug is now developed in labs versus extracted from forests, Canales says the protection of the cinchona and the endangered \u201cpharmacy of the world\u201d that nurtures it, is crucial for the discovery of new drugs in the future.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\"Today,<\/picture>\n
\n
\n

Today, scientists believe that centuries of harvesting has changed the genetic structure of cinchona plants in the Andes (Credit: Celso Roldan\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

In the absence of government protection of cinchona, local conservation groups are stepping in. Environmental organisation Semilla Bendita<\/a>, literally \u201cblessed seeds\u201d, is planning to plant 2021 cinchona seeds for the 200th anniversary of Peru\u2019s independence in 2021, and scientists like Schlagenhauf hope that more efforts to preserve the Andes\u2019 biodiversity will follow.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat the story of quinine shows is that biodiversity and human health go hand in hand,\u201d Schlagenhauf said. \u201cPeople often think of plant-based remedies as \u2018alternative medicine\u2019, but it is to plants that we owe some of the major medicinal breakthroughs in human history.<\/p>\n

Join more than three million BBC Travel fans by liking us on\u00a0<\/em>Facebook<\/a>, or follow us on\u00a0<\/em>Twitter<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

If you liked this story,\u00a0<\/em>sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter<\/a>\u00a0called “The Essential List”. A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Worklife and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n