What would it take in terms of the structural reforms in science, technology, and culture to cultivate sustainable therapeutic and preventive medicine innovations against zoonotic infections such as coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in the 21st century? In May 2019, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services warned that “around one million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction.” Biodiversity is essential for drug discovery and development. We are currently facing a dual challenge in therapeutics innovation with COVID-19 and loss in planetary biodiversity. Hence, there is an urgent need for new ideas and strategies for drug discovery as well as repurposed drugs for the COVID-19 pandemic. To these ends, the existing scholarship in, and the field of precision herbal medicine provide an alternative source for discovery of novel therapeutics against the novel coronavirus. We propose that the application of precision herbal medicine in Africa could usefully contribute to current efforts for therapeutics innovation for the COVID-19 pandemic, and beyond. The pandemic calls for interdisciplinary dialogue and turning up the volume for precision herbal medicine in Africa, and importantly, in ways informed by robust systems science as well as broad public engagement to codesign medicines in the 21st century.

中文翻译：

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在COVID-19和行星生物多样性丧失时代提高非洲精密草药的数量。

就科学，技术和文化的结构改革而言，在21世纪培养针对人畜共患病感染（例如2019年冠状病毒病（COVID-19））的可持续治疗和预防医学创新需要采取什么措施？2019年5月，政府间生物多样性和生态系统服务科学政策平台警告说：“现在大约有100万动植物物种面临灭绝的威胁。” 生物多样性对于药物发现和开发至关重要。目前，我们在COVID-19疗法创新和行星生物多样性丧失方面面临着双重挑战。因此，迫切需要用于药物发现的新思想和新策略以及针对COVID-19大流行的重新定型药物。为此，现有的奖学金 精密草药领域以及精密草药领域为发现针对新型冠状病毒的新型疗法提供了另一种来源。我们建议在非洲使用精密草药可以有效地推动当前针对COVID-19大流行及其他流行病的治疗创新。这场大流行病呼吁跨学科对话，并提高非洲精密草药的销量，而且重要的是，要借助健全的系统科学以及广泛的公众参与来为21世纪的药品进行符号化。