Meet the Wild Chimpanzees Revealing the Medicinal Properties of Plants to Researchers

July 28, 2024 | Source: PBS News

Scientists are uncovering the healing power of plants with help from an unlikely source: chimpanzees. For years, researchers at the University of Oxford have taken samples of plants favored by injured wild chimps to learn about their medicinal properties. Sangeeta Kandola of Independent Television News reports.

It’s all about the survival of the fittest in the jungle, and to stay fit, you have to stay well. According to new research, wild chimps are the champions are doing just that. Eating wood.

Over the past four years, scientists have been observing to chimpanzee communities in the forests of Uganda, they found that chimps that were sick or injured was seeking out and eating plants that have pain relieving an antibacterial properties.

Elodie Freymann, Primate Researcher, University of Oxford: Chimps have their diet and they stick to it relatively and several of these plants are very, very rarely consumed. So the fact that these sick or injured chimpanzees were seeking out these rare plants at the specific time and other group members sitting nearby didn’t seek them out. One can read intentionality into that.