With adulteration in traditional medicine becoming grave concern, time for Ayush Ministry to take action
In 2015, Chinese scientist Youyou Tu won the Nobel Prize for medicine for her application of traditional Chinese medicine to create a modern-day malaria medicine.
During the press conference, the Nobel Committee in Stockholm announced that her work was based on research and using tips from traditional Chinese medicine as opposed to the medication being based out of traditional medicine.
Last year, this reporter met an acupressure expert who also dabbled in homeopathy to understand why traditional medicine was frowned upon. He said that while there were colleges teaching alternative and traditional medicine in India, there wasn’t enough money getting pumped in for research.
And then this morning, a report in The Hindu spoke on the presence of heavy metals and spurious plant extracts in traditional medicines. This study, the report said, showed that traditional medicine could pose serious health risks.
Quoting a report from the journal Drug Safety, the report cited a 2016 joint study by Indian and Canadian scientists suggested traditional medicine that contain the bark of the Ashoka tree as an ingredient are mostly adulterated. According to the Indian Science Journal, the bark has some components that can be used to treat uterine diseases.
From there, the scientists focused their …read more
