With over 50,000 distinct species in sub-Saharan Africa alone, the African continent is endowed with an enormous wealth of plant resources. While more than 25 percent of known species have been used for several centuries in traditional African medicine for the prevention and treatment of diseases, Africa remains a minor player in the global natural
Modern medicine has reached a point where the patient is not treated as a biopsychosocial-spiritual being but rather is seen as a virtual identity consisting of laboratory findings and images. More focus is placed on relieving the symptoms instead of curing the disease. Mostly, patients are turned into lifetime medication-dependent individuals. New medicines are needed to overcome the side effects, complications, resistance, and intolerance caused by pharmacological and interventional therapies. In hopes of drug-free and painless alternative treatments with fewer complications, there has been a trend to revisit traditional methods that have been dismissed by modern medicine. Traditional medicine has to be reevaluated with modern scientific methods to complement and integrate with evidence-based modern medicine.
Traditional health practitioners in Africa are an important human resource in health care, and there are reasons why ministries of health might want to formulate an overt policy toward traditional medicine. Here are some policy options to consider.
This volume in the series is devoted to Africa, a continent that possesses a vast treasure of medicinal plants and has produced some exclusive materials for the world market. This volume is expected to strengthen the medicinal plant sector in African countries by making comprehensive information on medicinal and aromatic plants available to policy-makers and entrepreneurs. It can be used to frame effective policies and create an environment conducive to the growth of the plant-based medicine industry, bringing economic benefit to African nations. It will help health organizations to improve the health of their people by using their own resources and a less expensive system of medicine, which is accepted by African society. It could also lead scientific communities to increase R&D activities in the field.
This report is structured in five parts: national framework for traditional and complementary medicine (T&CM); product regulation; practices and practitioners; the challenges faced by countries; and finally the country profiles. Apart from the section on practices and practitioners the report is consistent with the format of the report of the first global survey in order to provide a useful comparison. The section on practices and practitioners which covers providers education and health insurance is a new section incorporated to reflect the emerging trends in T&CM and to gather new information regarding these topics at a national level. All new information received has been incorporated into individual country profiles and data graphs. The report captures the three phases of progress made by Member States; that is before and after the first WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy (1999?2005) from the first global survey to the second global survey (2005?2012) and from the second survey to the most recent timeline (2012?2018).
This text explores the multidisciplinary context of African Indigenous Knowledge Systems from scholars and scholar activists committed to the interrogation, production, articulation, dissemination and general development of endogenous and indigenous modes of intellectual activity and praxis. The work reinforces the demand for the decolonization of the academy and makes the case for a paradigmatic shift in content, subject matter and curriculum in institutions in Africa and elsewhere – with a view to challenging and rejecting disinformation and intellectual servitude. Indigenous intellectual discourses related to diverse disciplines take center stage in this volume with a focus on education, mathematics, medicine, chemistry and engineering in their historical and contemporary context.
Millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa suffer from mental, neurological, and substance use (MNS) disorders, and most do not have the resources to obtain treatment. The Uganda National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine hosted a workshop to discuss the state of care for MNS disorders in sub-Saharan Africa.
Prevention of mental illness and mental health promotion have often been ignored in the past, both in undergraduate and postgraduate curricula. Recently, however, there has been a clear shift towards public mental health, as a result of increasing scientific evidence that both these actions have a serious potential to reduce the onset of illness and subsequent burden as a result of mental illness and related social, economic and political costs. A clear distinction between prevention of mental illness and mental health promotion is critical. Selective prevention, both at societal and individual level, is an important way forward. The Oxford Textbook of Public Mental Health brings together the increasing interest in public mental health and the growing emphasis on the prevention of mental ill health and promotion of well-being into a single comprehensive textbook. Comprising international experiences of mental health promotion and mental well-being, chapters are supplemented with practical examples and illustrations to provide the most relevant information succinctly. This book will serve as an essential resource for mental and public health professionals, as well as for commissioners of services, nurses and community health visitors.
Various types of traditional medicine and other medical practices referred to as complementary or alternative medicine are increasingly used in both developing and developed countries, and the regulatory frameworks established vary considerably. This publication reviews information on their legal status in 123 countries, and is intended to facilitate the development of legal frameworks and sharing of experience between countries. The review will be useful not only to policy makers, but also to researchers, universities, the public, insurance companies and pharmaceutical industries.
