EMBARGO: Immediate Release
Date: 23 February 2008
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HEALTH MINISTER’S PROMOTION OF UNSAFE MEDICINE DISCONCERTING

Doctors For Life International (DFL) is encouraged by the move towards submitting Traditional African Medicine (TAM) to scientific testing and clinical trials. At the same time we find Health Minister Manto Tshabalala Msimang’s comments inappropriate and counterproductive. During an address to the Presidential Task Team on African Traditional Medicine Minister Msimang state that “we cannot use western models of protocols for research and development. We should guard getting bogged down with clinical trials”. Being inconsequent with scientific safeguards will leave ample loopholes to make it virtually inevitable for the general public who use untested TAM, to ingest substances from scavenged body parts that are mixed with some of these medicines. This will lead the SA pharmaceutical industry further up the garden path – similar to the disastrous HIV/AIDS policy.

Currently human body parts somehow find their way to the consumer without ever being advertised as such. However, from the extremely high incidence of muti-killings, it is clear that some potions sold as traditional African herbal medicine contain these human body parts.

In just the past month several muti murders came to the light. Last week police had to use force (including stun grenades) to prevent a house near Durban from being torched by hundreds of people angered by “witchcraft” killings. Two weeks ago an eight-year-old boy from Johannesburg was murdered and his private parts sliced off by an alleged muti merchant. Last month residents of Kwazakhele and Missionvale in Port Elizabeth are horrified by the discovery of two bodies that were brutally dismembered in what police believe were muti murders.

DFL has numerous testimonies of traditional healers using human body parts in herbal mixtures. Usually the medicine is considered more powerful if the body parts are removed while the victim is still alive. Human genitals are often used in love potions and remedies for infertility and/or impotence.

In a study that analyzed cases of acute poisoning admitted to Ga-Rankuwa Hospital, Pretoria over a 5 year period poisoning with traditional medicines resulted in the highest mortality, accounting for 51.7% of all deaths that were due to acute poisoning. Traditional healers were the main source of the medicines, and in some cases substances were bought at a shop for African remedies. Another study analyzed the Johannesburg forensic database over 5 years and found that (African) traditional remedies were involved in 43% of poisoning cases.

DFL strongly believes that the development of training standards and guidelines for institutions, methodologies for research into traditional medicine therapies and products, and guidelines for use during manufacture of traditional medicine products, must precede accreditation of any person(s) as a “traditional health practitioner”.

DFL is not ignorant of the role that plants or herbs played, and still play in the development of useful, safe and effective medication. DFL does not advocate a western yard stick to evaluate TAM but empirical science. Just as 1 + 1 equal 2 for Africans and Westerners, Christians, Muslims, Hindus or Animists, so empirical science judges in a neutral way the efficacy and safety of these medicines. South African research institutions such as the Medical Research Council (MRC) are starting to document and conduct scientific tests of indigenous plants and herbs traditionally used for medicinal purposes. This is a step in the right direction.

‘Doctors for Life International’ represents more than 1500 medical doctors and specialists. Since 1991 DFL has been active in promoting the safety and efficacy of health care for all South Africans. For more, visit www.doctorsforlifeinternational.com

'Doctors for Life International' represents more than 1400 medical doctors and specialists, three-quarters of who practice in South Africa. Since 1991 DFL has been actively promoting health care that is safe and efficient for all South Africans. DFL was founded as a South African organization in 1991 and has spread across the globe. DFL is involved in several community projects including orphan care, the care of terminal AIDS patients, malaria prevention and the care of abused women.