Malaria saved the lives of thousands of workers and helped develop the methods used in future public-health campaigns against the disease. The first effective treatment for malaria came from the bark of cinchona tree, which contains quinine. This tree grows on the slopes of the Andes, mainly in Peru. The indigenous peoples of Peru made a tincture of cinchona to control fever. Its effectiveness against malaria was found and the Jesuits introduced the treatment to Europe around 1640; by 1677, it was included in the London Pharmacopoeia as an antimalarial treatment. It was not until 1820 that the active ingredient, quinine,
Cinchona South America, the species had geographically distinct distributions. The introduction of several species into cultivation in the same areas in India and Java, respectively, by the English and Dutch East India Companies led to the formation of hybrids. Linnaeus described the genus based on the species "Cinchona officinalis." Nearly 300 species have been described and named in the genus but a revision of the genus in 1998 identified 23 distinct species. The febrifugal properties of bark from trees now known to be in the genus "Cinchona" were used by many South American cultures but malaria was an Old World disease