§3.2 Method of Treatment Using Natural Products and Herbs
| Jurisdiction | United States |
| Publication year | 2022 |
§3.2 Method of Treatment Using Natural Products and Herbs
According to Subhuti Dharmananda, founder and director of the Institute for Traditional Medicines, "all cultures, the origins of herbal medicine or traditional medical practice are lost in the mists of time. However, there is little doubt humans used herbs for healing well before anything could be written about them."34
§3.2.1 Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM)
TCM is a specialized branch of treatment that focuses on health maintenance, emphasizes enhancing the body's resistance to diseases, and shows advantages in early intervention, personalized, and combination therapies.35 TCM is practiced by focusing on several theories as they relate to the human body.
§3.2.1.1 Yin-Yang Theory
The concepts of Yin and Yang are the foundations of traditional Chinese medicine.36 The character for Yin is female, "the dark side of the mountain," and represents qualities such as cold, stillness, passiveness, and darkness. The character for Yang is masculine, "the bright side of the mountain," and represents such qualities as warmth, activity, light, and expression. The principle of medical treatment involves applying the concepts of Yin and Yang in a person.37
§3.2.1.2 Theory of Five Elements
The theory of five elements describes the movement and changing laws of the five materials of wood, fire, earth, metal, and water in nature. Each element has specific characteristics and can promote or restrict the other elements. In the medicinal field, the theory of five elements serves to categorize various tissues and functions of the human body into five physiological systems. TCM uses the five-element theory to explain the physiological and pathological interrelations, as well as the relationship between the human body and the environment.38
§3.2.1.3 Theory of Four Natures and Five Flavors
Food and herbs are of four natures, those being cold, heat, warmth, and coolness, and they have five flavors, being pungent, sweet, sour, bitter, and salty. Heat and warmth belong to Yang, and cold and coolness belong to Yin. Pungent and sweet belong to Yang, and sour, bitter, and salty belong to Yin. TCM aims to balance the Yin-Yang of the human body by the balance of the Yin-Yang nature of food and herbs.39
It is believed that the concept of Yin-Yang balance is the unique concept indicating the harmony of internal organs and the dominating key of the TCM. The Yin-Yang theory has served as the foundation and the guideline for the explanation of etiology of diseases, diagnosis, and treatments throughout the history of Chinese medicine.40
§3.2.1.4 TCM Decoction
The commonly used form of Chinese herbal medicine is the decoction. The preparation of the decoction directly influences the therapeutic result. In the traditional way, the herbal decoction should be prepared every day during the treatment course, and the decoction procedure involves control of heat time and heat strength.41 Presently, herbs are often combined in formulas and given as teas, capsules, liquid extracts, and granules.
§3.2.1.5 Issues and Development of TCM
TCM are gaining more and more attention all over the world. In the process of modernization and globalization of TCMs, there are some problems, such as safety issues, lack of understanding of TCM principles in health and disease, inconsistency, and uncontrollability of the quality of TCMs.42 In the western countries, the increasing use of TCM has created both acceptance and skepticism of TCM practice.43
The belief in the promise of herbal remedies stimulates the development of TCM. The first compound derived from Chinese herbal remedies to enter the western pharmacopoeia was ephedrine. A Japanese scientist isolated it in the 1880s from the Chinese medicinal herb mahuang.44 The next significant pharmaceutical, artemisinin, was derived from a Chinese medicinal herb.45 To honor the scientist, Youyou Tu, who discovered this medicine, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2015.46 Those successful discoveries prompt new research on TCM. It was reported that mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan are ramping up efforts to screen the 10,000 or so plants described in the Chinese herbal medicine literature. In addition to searching for new drug leads, they are investigating the herbal remedies themselves.47
§3.2.2 African Traditional Medicine
Until modern development and a breakthrough in the science of medicine and the related field of human endeavors, most African cultures believed that sicknesses and ailments are caused either by a person's sin, or they are afflictions sent by someone's enemy. African cultures also believed that germs or unhealthy living may be responsible for minor illnesses.48
Traditional medicine in Africa is a two-prong issue. The first prong relates to the belief in the supra-natural (spirit), voodoo, or occult. There are beliefs that illnesses, including major illnesses like cancer, heart diseases, and even psychiatric problems, are the handiwork of evil-doers such as witches, magicians, or sorcerers. Such illness cannot be cured by herbal medicine alone.
The second prong recognizes that unhealthy living, minor accidents, and germs may be responsible for certain ailments. And the use of herbs and natural products to treat such ailments is commonly accepted and practiced.
Thus, treating diseases and sicknesses in most African cultures is approached in the realm of both the metaphysical and the physical. The metaphysical is the unexplainable, the supra-natural, or the occult. Even today, despite scientific explanations for the cause of most sicknesses and ailments, the belief in the mystical causation of sicknesses is widespread among African cultures, and training in western education has not slowed many Africans in this belief.
Treating certain ailments believed traceable to the supra-natural is an exclusive preserve for sorcerers, witches, and traditional priests that lay claim to celestial powers. The physical and common minor illnesses caused by germs, etc., are within the exclusive purview of herbalists or traditional healers or medicine men who depend largely on the use of natural products and herbs. This practice can aptly be referred to as herbalism; the traditional medical treatment of using herbs, roots, leaves, latex, resin, and other natural products singly or as a mixture in curing or managing diseases. These include the use of whole or parts of animals, e.g., chameleon, tortoise, snail, millipede, snake heads, bone, claw, and other mineral substances.49
Traditional healers and medicine men, apart from providing health services to their people, usually hold important political positions moderating issues on governance, ethics, family formation, religion, and serve as arbiters for disputes in villages.50 Traditional healers and medicine men outnumber university-trained medical doctors.51 It is estimated that the traditional healer to population ratio in Africa is 1:35052 and that 80-85% of all persons living in sub-Saharan Africa receive their health care and health education from practitioners of traditional medicine.53
The nature, efficacy, and potency of African traditional medicine to manage illnesses is misunderstood and often challenged by modern medicine. This is because African traditional herbal medicine, until very recently, was not written. Furthermore, it is misunderstood because adequate and comprehensive research has not been carried out on its components and practices. Further, the concept of African traditional medicine is often thought as encompassing sorcery and occult practices. The works of charlatans preying on the unknowing patients succeeds in casting doubts on the efficacy and science of African herbal medicine and practice.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has recognized that traditional medicine is a major source of health services throughout Africa, and has recommended that traditional medicine be legalized, regulated, and incorporated into the national health care system of all member states.54 The African Union (AU),55 through the declarations of New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD),56 has affirmed its support for the use of African traditional medicine and indigenous science to help find African solutions to African health problems.57
§3.2.3 Ayurveda Practice in India
Ayurveda is a holistic system of healing that evolved among the Brahmin sages of ancient India some 3,000-5,000 years ago.58 It is believed to be the oldest healing science in existence, from which all other systems emerged.59 It is also a philosophy based on a deep understanding of the human body, the mind, and the human spirit.60
Ayurveda is made up of two Sanskrit words, Ayu, meaning life, and Veda,61 meaning knowledge of life. Ayurveda means to "know about life."62 In Ayurvedic theory, everything exists in relation to something else.63 This theory of the knowledge of life and the understanding and appreciation of everything, Ayurveda asserts, can allow a man live a healthy life. Simply put, Ayurveda explains the laws of nature that cause health and diseases.64
According to Ayurvedic teaching, the first cause of illness is the loss of faith in the Divine, i.e., an experience of spiritual emptiness.65 Illness develops due to internal conditions, for example, foods and liquids, or external conditions, for example, seasons and life style.66 Disharmony between nature and man causes illnesses, and the remedy for these diseases exists in nature and the individual. The remedy is the re-establishment of lost harmony—Ayurveda lays down principles designed to re-establish and maintain harmony in the person and the natural world.67
Ayurveda provides guidance regarding food and lifestyle to help cure, manage, and prevent diseases. There are an array of physical treatments including medication relying upon natural and herbal remedies,68 massage, yoga, and cleansing and detoxification programs. There are also...
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