Jayden Cort, 10th Grade
Medicine overall has constantly been improving with the help of multiple famous scientists/ pharmaceutical scientists over the course of the last few centuries. Due to this improvement of medicine over 500,000 people with diseases are saved yearly and over 149 million years of life since 1981. There are also multiple types of medicine that have saved people such as Injections,Tablets,Liquids,Capsules, and multiple other life saving medicines. Traditional/ Alternative medicine, though, works completely different from how modern (medical) medicine usually works. Both forms of medicine can collide and work together very well though, but first we need to understand what these types of medicines really are.
Traditional medicine is a type of medicine that is mainly focused on cultural practices and beliefs based mainly on knowledge. Some examples of this type of medicine are herbal remedies such as acupuncture, which is pricking the skin with needles to alleviate pain and treat physical, mental, and emotional conditions such as anxiety. Traditional Medicine also originated from India, specially a place a named Atharvaveda in 2000 B.C. People who use traditional types of medicines are usually located in Africa, China, and India due to their lack of accessibility to modern medicine, mostly in Africa. Actually, according to the article “China and Africa: the ‘power’ of traditional medicine”, over 80% of people in Africa use traditional medicine. Also in 2020, while The Northern Hemisphere was racing to create a vaccine for Covid-19, China was already producing and selling their new traditional medicine named “Traditional Chinese Medicine” (TCM) as an effective treatment for this disease. Apparently, this medicine overall worked better than the Covid-19 disease because 90% of people said it was very effective in curing them from this disease. In the United States, only 70% of people felt like the Vaccine for Covid-19 (modern medicine) was effective, and although that’s still good that’s not nearly as good as 90%, such as in China. China has also spread TCM to Africa as far back as in the 1960s, and they were allies until about 2020, when the allegations of China’s wildlife management came out. This is only some of traditional medicine, as there are more forms all throughout other countries
Another country with a great form of traditional medicine is Thailand, and that is their practice of beliefs. People in Thailand believes that humans are made up of 4 different elements, and these elements are earth, water, air, and fire. This is because their religious beliefs (Buddhists) is that all 4 elements need to be in balance to sustain good health. Much of Thailand medicine comes from the philosophy that Thailand medicine comes from Ayurveda, which is a traditional medicine that originated from India. Ayurveda also helps people adapt a healthier lifestyle, which could be used with physical health and mental health. There is also another form of medicine in Thailand and that is massage therapy. This type of therapy/medicine is also regarded to be the most powerful form of medicine. This treatment combines the use of acupressure( the release of muscular tension using applied pressure),body massage, and heavy stretching but without the usage of oils. Massage therapy can help reduce stress greatly, boost energy, relieve headaches, and stimulate circulation of energy. This, let alone is a significant form of medicine that millions of people trust due to no drugs being involved, meaning that nothing is going into people’s bodies, which helps allow people to feel that their specialists/doctors are more trustworthy. Traditional medicine is looked upon as one of the most supported medicines, and overall that can help people more confident in using medicine. This is not the only type of medicine that people rely on though, as there is also alternative medicine.
Alternative Medicine is forms of medicine that focus more on mental health and therapy. This medicine is not considered an orthodox by the medical field due the multiple theories and traditions it holds alone. Alternative Medicine is also not taught in medical schools since it’s not looked upon as orthodox, and it’s also not part of dominant health care. Alternative medicine includes multiple practices such as
reflexology (gentle pressure to your feet and hands), spiritual healing, hypnotherapy (the use of hypnosis as a healing technique), or also acupuncture, which is similar to traditional medicine. Usually people who use this medicine have stopped having faith in orthodox medicine, or because the Alternative Medicine goes well together with their religious beliefs. Specific countries that use Alternative Medicine are India, where it was also birthed which is similar to Traditional Medicine, Japan, Thailand, and China. It is also good to know that usually middle ages females usually participate in using this type of medicine. Although this medicine may seem like it’s very effective, it also definitely has its downsides.
Alternative Medicine has one major, straightforward problem, which is that this form of medicine has a lack of scientific evidence to prove that it’s healthy. Some scientists have actually found major flaws in some types of this medicine, which makes it understandable on why it’s still not an orthodox medicine. Alternative therapies/ medicine can also be expensive too, and depending on the person/place, they might not be able to gain a lot of attraction due to people just simply not affording it. Another major problem is that usually Alternative Medicine has inconsistencies with the treatment of their product, meaning that someone could actually eventually loose their lives due to the product either not being in stock, or it just not being produced overall. These problems definitely take away from the sustainability of Alternative Medicine, but that doesn’t mean that they are 100% more harmful than they do good.
If you apply Modern Medicine with Traditional and Alternative Medicine, there would a a great result. This is because as we looked at the differences between Traditional and Alternative medicine, we’ve seen how people are more trustworthy to both of these types of medicine because it includes some cultural values instead of mainly drug use. If you were to apply characteristics of all 3 of these types of medicine together, it would create great results for everyone, including scientists, doctors, and patients. This would be done with the use of taking multiple different beliefs into place, and combing all of these ideas into one. This is how Traditional and Alternative Medicine and be integrated with Modern Medicine.
Work Cited:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9895186/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1202065/population-with-covid-vaccine-by-state-us/
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