A scientifically minded person would say that these treatments violate the laws of chemistry. But if your symptoms are getting better, isn’t it a good thing to respond to a placebo because that’s the goal after all?
“Ayurveda is a way of life. If the world can embrace yoga, it will embrace Ayurveda too,” said none other than Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the 6th World Ayurveda Congress held at Delhi’s Pragati Maidan last week. The validation brought cheers to the hundreds of “folk therapists” in attendance who have been fighting to have their skills recognized. These practitioners primarily work in rural areas and use healing techniques learned from previous generations. It is well known that Prime Minister Modi is a vegetarian who practices yoga, and his recently established Ministry of Ayush (an acronym for Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy) is perhaps a reflection of his lifestyle. Conceivable. In September, Prime Minister Modi also asked the United Nations to consider establishing an International Day of Yoga.
In a quote given to this newspaper (Delhi Newsline, November 10), one of the practitioners who participated in the Ayurveda conference and studied up to class 8 said, We are masters of pradarshan bhasha (language of symptoms). I treat with 3000 different herbs that I have personally picked from the Western Ghats. But 16 per cent of freshwater fish, dragonflies and aquatic plants in the Western Ghats are becoming extinct due to water pollution and lack of drainage and solid waste treatment systems, according to a report published in Down to Earth magazine. That’s what it means. May God help those who are eating the paste made from herbs here. If India is serious about promoting these ancient treatments, it must stop the quacks operating within its system.
Proponents of alternative medicine argue that Western countries have contributed the most to the world as it is, and therefore have dominated our thinking with allopathy. There is no dispute that the largest funder of medical research is the US National Institutes of Health (NIH). However, yoga is gaining legitimacy and will be As the stature of Ayurveda grows, it is logical that the world will rise up and take notice of Ayurveda. Contrary to the perception of most skeptics, Ayurvedic doctors attend some medical school and have a Bachelor of Ayurvedic Medicine/Surgery degree. (BAMS).For Unani, there is Unani Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery (a rather unfortunate abbreviation, BUMS).Both are 5 year courses and include a year of internship. Not that they don’t work, but most of us think they have as much scientific credibility as snake charmers or extraterrestrials.
Oddly enough, people are willing to suspend disbelief when it comes to homeopathy. But I don’t know a single person who hasn’t tried it, and many continue to swear by it. A scientifically minded person would say that these treatments violate the laws of chemistry. But if your symptoms are getting better, isn’t it a good thing to respond to a placebo because that’s the goal after all? Thanks to Ayush, plant-based medicines, natural remedies, and meditation will truly become mainstream. Allopathy does not have all the solutions. Patients are only interested in whether the drug works, not why.
