Apprehensions over WHO move on traditional Chinese medicine
NEWDELHI: Wildlife scientists and activists across the world are concerned over reports that the World Health Organization (WHO) will formally recognise traditional medicine — including the Chinese, Japanese and Korean medicines, some of which are prepared using animal body parts — at the 72nd World Health Assembly being held in Geneva this week.
The 11th version of WHO’S International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD), to be adopted at the Assembly, has a supplementary chapter on traditional medicine conditions . The World Health Assembly is the decision-making body of the WHO.
Panthera, a global wild cat conservation body, the Environmental Investigation Agency and the Wildlife Conservation Trust on Monday urged the WHO to condemn the use of traditional Chinese medicine that contain animal parts, including those from captive bred specimens.
“The so called curative properties are attributed to body part derivatives from wild tiger ...hence this will further endanger the status of wild tiger in tiger range countries,” said Rajesh Gopal, secretary general of Global Tiger Forum. India has the largest number of tigers in the world — 2,226, according to the 2014 tiger census. The 2018 census estimations are yet to be released. Tiger, pangolin, bear, rhino and other species are often poached for their organs that are used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) to treat a variety of ailments.
The Wildlife Crime Control Bureau of India, which launched a campaign on curbing illegal trafficking in wildlife at airports on Monday, said in a statement, “Tiger is traded for its skin, bones and body parts; Pangolin, the most illegally traded wild mammal on the planet is trafficked for its meat and its scales are used in traditional medicines .... ”
Officials of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), however, refused to comment on the development.
“The use of bones and other body parts of tigers in TCM has no proven scientific basis. It is based on culture and belief. If TCM is globally recognised as a type of modern medicine it would encourage a certain section of people abroad to use tiger products, which in turn will escalate poaching pressures on the species in the range countries,” said Dipankar Ghose, World Wide Fund (Wwf)-india’s species and landscape programme director.
The WHO did not respond to requests for comment.
“As a scientist, I am not a fan on any traditional medicine system because they are not based on empiricism. China has forbidden the use of tiger parts in Chinese medicine. They have also prohibited poaching of tigers. I don’t think this issue should be mixed up with tiger conservation,” said Ullas Karanth, a tiger expert.