It is called medicinal plants those plants that can be used whole or specific parts (leaves, flowers, fruits, bark, stems or roots) to treat diseases of humans and animals. The therapeutic action (relief or improvement), is due to chemicals called active ingredients . The use of plants in traditional medicine dates back to prehistoric times, but current science has made it possible to identify, isolate and produce hundreds of active ingredients for the preparation of drugs used in the treatment of various diseases. However, the traditional use of medicinal plants still persists, especially in less industrialized societies with difficulties in accessing medicines. Thus the World Health Organization (WHO) coordinates a network to encourage the safe and rational use of traditional medicine, because, for the most part, not all medicinal plants are usually beneficial to the body, or simply the active ingredient must be carefully dosed. 1 The medicinal plant is usually prepared in different ways, in traditional medicine they are used in infusions, cooked, in poultices or in salads for direct consumption. Pharmaceutical technology allows the application of certain extracts of medicinal plants in capsule- like presentations, The use of plant-based remedies dates back to prehistoric times, and was one of the most widespread forms of medicine, in which virtually all known cultures have evidence of the medicinal use of some plants. Although the use of plant species for therapeutic purposes is very old, at first it was linked to magic, each population built their beliefs in an attempt to understand their immediate environment, some cultures to this day retain these beliefs and the Science has come to critically explain each plant, each extract, each formula, finding precisely the active principles responsible for biological activity. The current pharmaceutical industry has relied on modern scientific knowledge for the synthesis and elaboration of some pharmacological molecules analogous to those present in certain plant species, and that many derived substances are part of the active ingredients of modern medicines, such as the famous aspirin . In addition, the scientific verification process has helped to find this type of molecule in various plant species traditionally used as medicinal plants, explaining certain therapeutic properties of these, together with discovering compounds that can serve as the basis for the development of new drugs for different applications. . Many of the drugs used today - such as opium, quinine, aspirin or digitalis - synthetically replicate or isolate the active ingredients of the same molecules present in traditional plant remedies used even in prehistoric times, even without knowledge of their active ingredients. . Its origin persists in the etymologies - such as salicylic acid, so called because it is extracted from the bark of the willow ( Salix spp.) Or digitalis, from the plant of the same name. The consumption of medicinal plants has been increasing in recent years around the world and its use is frequent in combination with medications prescribed by doctors. The false belief that plant-based products are safe and even advantageous due to their supposed "natural" character is widespread, a reasoning that is not very compatible with the fact that their therapeutic effect is attributed to their content in active ingredients with pharmacological activity. . This false perception is based on the tradition of its use instead of systematic studies evaluating its safety, which generally do not exist. Without these studies, only those obvious, very frequent and immediately occurring risks can be detected. Toxics and poisons, such as hemlock, cyanide, poisonous mushroom toxins and scorpion venom, are products as natural as honey.