The First WHO Traditional Medicine Global Summit
Recently the first “World Health Organization (WHO) Global Summit on Traditional Medicine” has been organized in Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
The summit discussed the role of ‘Traditional Complementary and Integrative Medicine (TCIM)’ in addressing health challenges.
For the first time such a summit discussed topics such as funding of ‘Traditional, Complementary and Integrative Medicine’, indigenous people’s health, quality assurance, traditional medical knowledge, biodiversity, trade, patient safety, etc.
The theme of the summit was “Towards Health and Well-being for All”.
Traditional Medicine:
- Traditional medicine refers to health practices, attitudes, knowledge, and beliefs for the treatment, diagnosis, and prevention of disease or for the welfare of people. It is treated with herbs and spiritual therapy.
- These include Ayurveda, Yoga, Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy (AYUSH) and Sowa Rigpa.
- Between 2014 and 2023, an 8-fold increase has been registered in the field of traditional medicine in India.
Benefits of traditional medicine:
- It is an easily accessible and economical treatment system.
- This method focuses on patient specific treatment and strives to achieve the best possible outcome.
- Its treatment does not cause any side effects or is nominal.
- It focuses on holistic care of an individual.
Measures taken to promote traditional medicine:
- The WHO Global Center for Traditional Medicine (GCTM) has been established in Jamnagar, Gujarat.
- The Astana Declaration on Primary Health Care (PHC), 2018 has been adopted. This declaration recognizes the need to incorporate traditional medical knowledge and techniques into PHC service delivery.
- AYUSH Information Cells have been set up in 39 countries to disseminate authentic information about the AYUSH system.
Source – The Hindu
