Traditional Medicine in Asia

Legislation and regulation of traditional systems of medicine – systems, practitioners and herbal products
Legislation and
regulation of traditional
systems of medicine –
systems, practitioners
and herbal products
society has medicines and practitioners
that have come to be labelled as
“traditional”.
When does a type of medicine or
practitioner become “traditional”? Given
that “traditional” is a relative term, and that
each country’s experience is unique, a
precise date cannot be easily determined.
Generally, it is the date of recognition
accorded, either by legislation or through
practice or official patronage, to a certain
type of medicine and practitioner thereof,
that serves as the cut-off date for the
demarcation of what we describe as
“western” or “modern” or “allopathic”
medicines and practitioners as against
“traditional” medicines and practitioners.
In practice, it is through an evolutionary
process that each system has emerged to,
or retained, its position of dominance.
Socio-historical and anthropological
studies1 Just as much as we have “traditional
foods” or “traditional dresses”, every
illustrate that this process
continues notwithstanding the legal status
because perceptions, beliefs and practices
of people are not easily amenable to
change through the force of law.
D. C. Jayasuriya
Shanti Jayasuriya
In considering the role of regulating
traditional medicine, two areas need to be
addressed:
� The regulation of traditional medicinal
products;
� The regulation of traditional medical
practitioners.
Before these aspects are considered, it
will be useful to examine what “traditional
medicine” is.
“Traditional Medicine” has been defined
in various ways; in most contexts, however,
its content and parameters are understood
even without a definition. A recent statutory
definition is to be found in the Public Health
Code of Burkina Faso of 1994: a
“Traditional medicine means the
aggregate of all knowledge and practices
of a physical or non-physical nature,
whether explicable or not, used in order
to diagnose, prevent, or eliminate
physical, mental, psychological, and social
disequilibrium, and based exclusively on
past experience and knowledge passed
on from generation to generation, either
orally or in writing.”
a Law No. 23/94/ADP of 19 May 1994 promulgating the Public Health Code (IDHL, 1995, 46 (4), 452).
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