"The rainforests hold answers to questions we have yet to ask," says ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin, "and with each medicine man that dies, it's as if a library burned down." He has spent much of the past four decades studying the shamans and healing plants of tropical America from Mexico to Argentina, mostly focused on the Amazon.  He notes there is no mental illness among these tribes, as they know how to deal with it. He's served as president of the Amazon Conservation Team,  which partnered with 55 tribes to map and improve management and protection of 80 million acres of ancestral rain forests. Mark Plotkin's book is Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice.
From the Archives: This live interview was recorded on April 8, 1995 on the nationally syndicated radio program The Laura Lee Show. See more at www.lauralee.com

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