Quinine side effects include deafness, low blood platelets, and an irregular heartbeat. Use can make one more prone to sunburn. While it is unclear if use during pregnancy causes harm to the baby, use to treat malaria during pregnancy is still recommended. Quinine is an alkaloid, a naturally occurring chemical compound. How it works as a medicine is not entirely clear. Quinine was first isolated in 1820 from the bark of a cinchona tree. Bark extracts have been used to treat malaria since at least 1632. It is on the World Health Organization's List of Essential Medicines, the most effective and
Schedula Romana treatment for malaria was found in the forests of the Andes in Peru. A such called fever tree, whose bark, made into powder and given as a beverage, cured the fevers and was known to have produced miraculous results in the local population. The bark was obtained from several species of the genus "Cinchona", of the Rubiaceae family. Popularized in Europe through the work of jesuits in America, the cinchona tree bark came to be known as Jesuit's bark. Perhaps the most prominent popularizer of the Jesuit's bark was a Spanish Jesuit Cardinal, Juan de Lugo. In 1643, Cardinal Lugo