Attempt to modernise ayurveda - My own mail to the newspaper.

[Guest guest]

Dear Sir,

 

The drug industry's concern at loosing $60 billion of revenue to herbal

medicines is understandable (Herbal Warning falls on deaf ears, Aug 20). After

the huge success of herbs in the beauty and skin care sector, prompting even the

multinationals to go " herbal " , the herbal drugs now threaten the very existence

of modern medicine. The FDA of the USA has struck by banning herbal products and

various vitamins from being sold OTC and the Indian drug industry is itching to

emulate them. If they succeed then the emerging monopoly of modern medicine will

spell doom for the health of the millions mauled by allopathy, who have been

desparately searching for an effective alternative. The doctors of the like of

Raghunath Mashelkar now have taken the safe route of trying to " modernise "

ayurveda. He talks of isolating the " active ingredients " of herbs and then maybe

finding a chemical equivalent so that allopaths can embrace ayurveda in its

folds and thereby nullify the threat. It should be noted

that such attempts have already been made and have failed to deliver the

desired results. For example, whereas the plant Rawolfia Serpentina is a potent

medicine in the hands of ayurveds in lowering high blood pressure, the attempts

by a drug major to introduce a drug based on the active ingredient only resulted

in severe symptoms of depression in patients and the drug had to be recalled

from the market. Just the use of herbs does not constitute ayurveda. Ayurveda is

a proven method of preventing illness and treating the sick with medicines

derived from the plant, mineral and animal kingdom based on certain principles

and depending on the physical, mental and emotional set up of individual

patients. " Modernising " the holistic science of ayurveda, proven in its efficacy

by 5000 years of existence, is best left to the ayurveds, the " modern " allopaths

need not be so concerned. They can instead concentrate in trying to diagnose

what gone so horribly wrong in their own stables.

 

Yours faithfully,

 

Jagannath Chatterjee

 

(address)................

 

 

 

 

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