Natural Remedies for Animal Health in Latin America

Since immemorial times, humans have been using plants and animals as medicinal sources according to the benefit that these resources offered. Latin America has a population whose culture is the result of a combination of different ethnic groups and has contributed to it becoming one of the most culturally diverse regions in the world. Similarly, the great abundance of natural resources that can be extracted from a rich biodiversity favors their use by traditional populations that depend on such resources to guarantee the health of their animals through a folk medicine practice known as ethnoveterinary medicine, which passed on through the generations. This chapter provides a compilation of the richness of species of animals and plants cited in the literature as being used for ethnoveterinary purposes in Latin America. The results show a plethora of biological species (364 species of plants and 61 animal species) for the treatment of diseases and sicknesses of livestock and herds in this area. The families of medicinal plants that were most frequently reported were Fabaceae and Asteraceae, whereas mammals were the animal group most reported as a source of drugs for ethnoveterinary treatments, followed by insects. These data reflect the existence of broad knowledge regarding the use of natural resources in traditional veterinary medicine in Latin America, a practice that has persisted over time.