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The history of medicine tells how, within the contexts of existing beliefs and techniques, various societies shaped their knowledge concerning the prevention of disease and the preservation of human health. Not all these systems survive but the origins of modern scientific (one might say, Western) medicine lie in the practices and cultures of these many civilizations. For a long time, many such societies remained isolated from the benefits (and also the dangers) of Western science; and the local traditions of folk medicine persisted. Tropical medicine developed through an awareness of the special medical conditions prevailing in certain geographical locations, and the work of medical scientists, trained in Western medicine, in those places. Garcia d'Orta (1501–1568) wrote the first book on tropical medicine in India (Coloquios dos simles, e drogas he
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