Cinchona, the tree miracle that saved mankind

    Malaria, a disease transmitted by the bite of an infected mosquito and caused by a parasite, Plasmodium, which infects red blood cells, haskilled more people than all wars and epidemics of plague in history. 

   Two of the bravest leaders in the world, Alexander the Great and OliverCromwell, were killed by the

terrible disease. The miraculous remedy for malaria was discovered in the sixteenth century, when Spanish conquistadors brought quinine, an alkaloid extracted from the bark of cinchona tree, which grows in the rainforest of Peru and Bolivia. Quininewas already used to treat disease by Quechua Indians. The antipaludic properties of cinchona bark began to be known in Europe around1630, thanks to the Jesuits who brought it to Rome from Peru. According to legend, the first person in Europe cured with quinine was the Countess of Chinchón, wife of Spain's Luis Jeronimo Cabrera, the fourth Earl of Chinchón, who became viceroy of Peru. The name of treecomes from the name of this family. Royalty such as Louis XIV of France, King Charles II of England, Queen of Spain were cured also thanks to the miraculous remedy. At first, protestants have avoided to use quinine, because it was a “papal medicine”. Oliver Cromwell died of malaria, in 1658, because he refused to deal with Jesuit cinchona bark from Peru. Quinine was reproduced in the chemical laboratory in 1940.But since last forms of malaria have become resistant to synthetic drug, the tree bark is again at highest price.