Must be woo

Medicines made from willow and other salicylate-rich plants appear in Egyptian pharonic pharmacology papyri [1] from the second millennium BCE. Hippocrates referred to their use of salicylic tea to reduce fevers around 400 BCE[citation needed], and were part of the pharmacopoeia of Western medicine in classical antiquity and the Middle Ages. Willow bark extract became recognized for its specific effects on fever, pain and inflammation in the mid-eighteenth century. Lewis and Clark allegedly used willow bark tea in 1803–1806 as a remedy for fever for members of the famous expedition. By the nineteenth century pharmacists were experimenting with and prescribing a variety of chemicals related to salicylic acid, the active component of willow extract.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_aspirin

That willow tree bark has medicinal benefits doesn't mean Venus fly trap extract cures cancer.

Most modern Western medicines are synthesized concentrates of botanical chemicals.

Often the whole herb is superior because of synergistic botanicals. All of Chinese medicine is based on this. And Chinese doctors seem to have billions of satisfied woo-worshiping patents.

...says Tu Youyou was not the main person involved in development of the drug.

"The Lasker committee named her “the discoverer of artemisinin.” Some Chinese and Western malariologists were outraged. Dr. Nicholas J. White, a prominent Oxford malaria researcher, said it was “not fair to credit this discovery to one individual”; he named others he considered equally deserving, including the clinical trial leader, Dr. Li, and a chemist, Li Ying."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/17/health/for-intrigue-malaria-drug-artemisinin-gets-the-prize.html