TCM Around the World
On January 18, 2017, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited the World Health Organization ( WHO) and met with Director- General Margaret Chan. President Xi brought with him a statue highlighting acupuncture as a gift to the WHO. As one of the most widely used forms of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), acupuncture is known throughout the world.
The heyday of TCM may just be arriving, as many of its treatment techniques, including acupuncture and massage, are being widely embraced by the world. TCM is finally going global.
Integrating with International Systems
According to the White Paper on Traditional Chinese Medicines released by the Information Office of the State Council of China in December 2016, TCM has spread to 183 countries and regions. Based on WHO statistics, 103 member countries have recognized the effectiveness of acupuncture in treating a variety of ailments. TCM has gradually merged into the international medicine system and is an official treatment in Russia, Cuba, Vietnam and the United Arab Emirates, among other countries.
In China, TCM is more popular in less developed areas, while abroad, it tends to get more exposure in more developed areas, according to Li Zhenji, vice president and co-founder of the World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies and former deputy director of the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine (SATCM).
“TCM’S development in Europe, the U.S.
and Australia has been much stronger than that in South Africa and South American countries,” he explained. TCM clinics in Britain, France and Canada number about 3,000 each, and Australia has about 4,000. Europe is home to 209 TCM educational institutions, accounting for a third of the world’s total.
Among the diverse forms of TCM, acupuncture is the most popular in Europe. According to La Stampa, a daily Italian newspaper, in 1984 many Italian hospitals began adding TCM clinics, and a total of 6 million Italians have received TCM treatment. Acupuncture schools also began opening throughout Italy and developing systematic curriculum standards. It has been reported that in the seven acupuncture schools accredited by the Italian Association of Acupuncture-moxibustion and TCM (AIAM), students can only receive vocational qualifications by completing 400 hours of theoretical study, 100 hours of interning and 50 hours of clinical practice.
Hurdles to Cross
TCM’S global mission has not been all smooth sailing. Western medicine is still dominant worldwide, and TCM only provides complementary treatment options. The first issue is big differences in cultural backgrounds and theoretical systems. Today, the term “Traditional Chinese Medicine” is widely recognized by the international scientific community. But according to Western medical theory, “medicine” should only be used to treat illness. Given the difference in philosophy, many Chinese pharmaceutical companies are frustrated when attempting to promote preventative TCM in foreign countries.
Second, public opinion about TCM also hinders its popularity abroad. Because TCM treatment is usually performed by individual clinics overseas, few international research programs have monitored TCM’S performance or provided qualified research data, so TCM is often considered pseudo-science abroad, remarked Liu Baoyan, vice-president of the Chinese Academy of TCM and president of the World Federation of AcupunctureMoxibustion Societies and the China Association for Acupuncture and Moxibustion.
After years of research, Europe’s medical community admits that acupuncture avoids creating drug resistance and lacks the side effects of Western medicine, but many doctors remain quite cautious about TCM treatment. Since the EU introduced “traditional herbal registration program instructions,” most TCM products have been sold as health products or food additives because they were not given legal identity as drugs. So, standardization is another problem hurting TCM’S global prospects.
Bert Van Duane, chief scientist at Figueras Technology Co., Ltd., spends many of his days standardizing and optimizing the process of massive production of ginseng, under the assumption that establishing solid and uniform TCM production standards to effectively monitor quality will overcome the main bottleneck hindering TCM’S acceptance by the European market. The efforts could be made in setting standards for seed selection and industrial production as well as effectively evaluating those standards.
“Belt and Road” Opportunities
Before 2015, the process of internationalizing TCM was akin to crossing the river by feeling the stones, due to a lack of central planning and deployment. However, since the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed and implemented, it has proved a new bridge to TCM opportunities.
On March 28, 2015, the Chinese government issued the Vision and Actions on Jointly Building the Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st-century Maritime Silk Road. The action plan proposed expanding cooperation on traditional medicine, signifying TCM’S inclu-
sion in national planning and position as a potential beneficiary of joint development.
TCM’S proliferation in countries and regions along the Belt and Road continues to grow. According to Chinese News of Tra
ditional Chinese Medicine, China exported US$37.7 billion worth of TCM in 2015. And most countries and regions that acknowledge TCM as part of mainstream medicine are found along the Belt and Road, where demand for TCM has signaled tremendous development potential.
Meanwhile, Tcm-related cooperation between overseas educational and medical organizations has also increased heavily. In 2015, the SATCM established 10 TCM centers in the U.S., France, Malaysia and other places thanks to governmental support from those countries. Many of them are now operating smoothly and attracting many local patients, said Wang Guoqiang, director of the SATCM.
In 2017, TCM benefited from another guiding document on investment for its internationalization. On January 16, the SATCM and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the Development Plan of Traditional Chinese Medicine in the “Belt and Road Initiative”
(2016-2020). According to the plan, a new pattern for comprehensive cooperation will form throughout Belt and Road countries and regions by 2020. Wang added that the SATCM has been actively promoting and implementing the plan.
“Thanks to intergovernmental cooperation, we can provide greater support for domestic and foreign TCM organizations and academic institutions at all levels to promote a greater variety of exchange activities,” Wang announced. “By helping non-governmental organizations go abroad, we hope to further promote intergovernmental cooperation, remove barriers impeding TCM’S internationalization and help TCM spread far and wide.”