**7. Orthodox drugs developed from medicinal plants indigenous to Africa**

About 52% of the drugs approved in the U.S. between 1981 and 2002 were from natural products mainly plants [6]. From these drugs, African medicinal plants have provided the drug vincristine (I) and vinblastine (II) from Madagascar periwinkle, combretastatin (III) obtained from the South African bush willow in the 1950 and maytansine (IV) from *Maytenus serrata* isolated in the early 1970s from the Ethiopian plant. This illustrates that, medicinal plants native to Africa are huge potential for the development of therapeutic agents. These drugs are potent anticancer drugs and some

*Some bioactive compounds from medicinal plants native to Africa.*


**Table 1.**

*Plants used for the development of drugs native to African countries.*

are still in use today all over the world in different forms as effective anticancer agents (**Figure 1** and **Table 1**) [8].
