Trees provide shade and shelter, and they bring oxygen while capturing carbon dioxide that is released into our air.Trees are also sources of lifesaving remedies. "Trees act as carbon captures, the bigger they are are, the more they capture, and soil also captures emission," Amy Greeson, pharmacist, explorer, healing seeker, author and filmmaker, said.Carbon Footprint CalculatorGreeson loves tending to trees in her garden. She admires their beauty and importance to the landscape. Her hunt for medicinal treatments and cures has taken her from her home and family pharmacy in the Triad to remote jungles of the Amazon, to island rainforests and into dense unexplored forests of the Congo. NASA: Carbon Cycle VideoGreeson's most recent trek with her Healing Seekers Team brought her to the Congo, where she met Dominique. Dominique is blind and was taught by his father to heal his village from the swamp forest. Dominique showed Greeson how to use the bark of a gumbo tree for migraine relief as leaves transformed into medicine droppers. RAINFOREST RESCUE SUCCESS: A new economic model for protecting tropical forests with Nat KeohaneGreeson also learned that the Mau'u'aki'aki plant was a cough medicine in disguise."The original snake was a venomous snake in Brazil," Greeson said about a specimen. "They isolated a compound in the venom and that became one of our most widely prescribed blood pressure medicines, Coumadin, a blood thinner came from mold."Groups of scientists examine each specimen Greeson brings home and considers how it may be replicated by modern medicine to treat or cure disease.Currently, specimens provided by indigenous healers show promising national, non-addictive pain relief. "There is not a doubt in my mind that those treatments are our there. Cures for viruses, for COVID, that those treatments are out there," Greeson said. However, we are racing against the climate clock. Global Forest WatchGreeson said that from our home in the Triad, we see climate change from a privileged place on Earth, with luxuries like running water and electricity. Some of our power is coming from coal-burning. Coal is considered a 'dirty fuel,' since burning it creates higher carbon emission and can contribute to poor air quality. But, it is often the only fuel available for some communities. NASA: Understanding Climate Change"In Madagascar, you're living in a hut, you have children, it gets cold at night, you're going to do whatever it takes to keep those children. If it's burning coal, you're going to burn coal," Greeson said. "So, the rest of the world can come together on this."Greeson's Madagascar expedition brought her to these majestic baobabs, known as the "mother tree."Parts of the tree are used by the local villagers to treat viral and bacterial illnesses. Baobab fruit is also a great source of vitamin-C. "In Madagascar, there are six endemic species of the eight known in the world, and they believe of this species there are only two remaining trees. They can't get those seeds to germinate, so there is a fear that these may be the last two remaining trees that ever exist on planet Earth," Greeson said.North Carolina Legacy Tree FundTriad development often includes clear-cutting, wiping out local habitats to put up new grocery stores or homes. Survival abroad comes at a huge cost as well.Clear Cutting In North CarolinaThousands of acres of land in Madagascar are unrecognizable to Greeson upon taking a return trip after a decade.A paradise of lush, green rainforest appears now like a dusty quilt of soil erosion.Slash and burn agriculture is fueling climate change with more carbon emissions and less tree canopy, which results in storing harmful greenhouse gases. Carbon Cycle Video World Meteorological Organization (WMO)"It's shocking to see the huge masses of land that are now barren," Greeson said. "We've got to take those miracles from nature and the brilliance of science in order to make them available to the rest of the world." Her book "And the Silent Spoke," as well as her film "Expedition Congo," have brought her awards, but Greeson says the greatest reward is if these miracles from nature lead to new life-saving drugs that might one day be on triad pharmacy shelves.Nasa: Climate Change & Fires"One thing that the team was dumbfounded with is that even when we go to these remote areas, we see plastic bottles from the Western world," she said.I was amazed to find dozens of water bottles left to litter the view on my recent trip to Linville Falls.My next article on our shifting climate will take us to Linville Falls and Grandfather Mountain to see more.