This paper discusses some of the links between biodiversity and traditional medicine, and addresses their implications to public health. We explore the importance of biodiversity and ecosystem services to global and human health, the risks which human impacts on ecosystems and biodiversity present to human health and welfare. The "protection" of traditional medicine may also aim at its preservation, requiring actions of very different nature, such as avoiding uses that may erode traditional medicine, addressing problems that negatively affect the life or culture of the communities that hold it, and documenting the relevant knowledge. Polysaccharides from different preparations of Radix Polygoni Multiflori Praeparata (PRPMA, PRPMB, PRPMC) were administered to D-galactose aging model mice. These treatments were able to significantly increase the activity of SOD and GSH-PX, and decrease MDA content, suggesting that the polysaccharides of Radix Polygoni Multiflori Praeparata, a traditional medicine, may have an anti-aging effect. Our results also strongly suggest that PRPMB is the main active polysaccharide preparation.