Botswana plans to recognize traditional medicines

   GABORONE, Dec. 8 -- Botswana is considering enacting legal instruments aimed at regulating traditional health practice for traditional medicines to be recognized and earn their rightful place alongside modern medicine.
   This follows the realization that integrative medicine is growing as alternative forms of medicine including the traditional ones, Lemogang Kwape, Botswana's health and wellness minister said Sunday while addressing traditional healers in Francistown, Botswana's second largest city.    
   Kwape said integrative medicines are now being used in tandem with conventional medicine.
   "It is about blending multiple treatments to improve health and quality of life," said Kwape, adding such a development would assist with the regulation of traditional healing thereby enhancing quality and ensure it is safe and effective for public consumption.
   He added that the world is moving towards embracing and adopting alternative medicine and efforts were being made to use both traditional and science in medicine "like what is happening in countries like China."
   According to Kwape, the demand for complementary medication was at an all-time high and many people were looking to alternative medicine, as a solution towards securing their health and quality of life.
   He said Botswana should take strategy points from the World Health Organization (WHO)'s traditional medicinal recommendations, which has called for the development of local production and conservation of medicinal plants and regulate practice of traditional medicine.
   Traditional medicine was part of many Botswana citizens' lives and they would highly benefit from its integration into the conventional health system in line with developing sustainable health, Samuel Kolane, a senior official in the ministry of health and wellness, told Xinhua.  
   WHO statistics show that approximately 80 percent of African communities use traditional medicine, as they are a cultural norm.  Xinhau