Traditional Medicine in Asia

Legislation and regulation of traditional systems of medicine – systems, practitioners and herbal products
called as “traditional medical practitioners”
because with the advent of the Western
system of medicine, Western medical
practitioners have come to enjoy an almost
monopolistic position, with the attendant
status, privileges and concessions. In some
countries, by law there are restrictions in
the use of the term “medical practitioner”
or “doctor’, thus placing traditional
medical practitioners at a disadvantage. It
has never been easy to establish the precise
role and status of traditional medical
practitioners. Community acceptability,
political patronage and perception as a
source of last resort when practitioners of
other systems have failed to provide relief
are some of the factors that come into play
in determining the recognition to be
accorded to them. Attempts have been
made by some countries to initiate a
process of dialogue and consultation with
a view to arriving at some compromise.
Mauritania, for instance, established a
working group on medicine and the
pharmacopoeia:
“to determine the situation of
traditional medicine and the traditional
pharmacopoeia in Mauritania and, in
particular:
� to examine the most appropriate and
realistic ways and means of establishing
an honest dialogue between the
official health services and traditional
practitioners in the spirit of the
objectives of health for all by the year
2000 through primary health care;
� to propose the most appropriate
mechanisms for identifying traditional
medical practitioners who are
amenable to such a dialogue in order
to determine and acknowledge the
part that they can play in the system of
comprehensive health care (health
promotion, prevention of disease and
disability, diagnosis and early treatment
of disease and rehabilitation.” g
A definition of a traditional health
practitioner is found in the Public Health
Code of Guinea of 1997: h “A traditional
health practitioner is a person recognized
by the community in which he lives as
competent to carry out diagnoses with
local sociocultural foundations and
contribute to the health and physical,
mental, social, and spiritual well-being of
the members of the locality concerned.” In
addition to this definition, there are separate
definitions of traditional therapists;
traditional midwives; herbalists; and,
medico-druggists. These are reproduced
below:
Traditional A person recognized by his
therapist locality as being competent to
carry out diagnoses and
dispense health care based on
the concepts of disease and
disability that prevail in that
locality;
Traditional A person recognized as
midwife competent to provide health
care to women and newborns
before, during and after
delivery, on the basis of the
concepts prevailing in the
locality concerned;
Herbalist A person who has a knowledge
of the customs and sells
medicinal plants;
Medico- A person who has a knowdruggist
ledge of the customs and sells
g Decision No. 1831 of 9 December 1981 establishing a working group on medicine and the pharmacopoeia (IDHL,
1983, 34 (1), 122).
h Law No. L/97/021/AN of 19 June 1997 (IDHL, 1999, 59 (2), 162).
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