Health Department to host Traditional Medicine Summit
Pretoria: The Department of Health will this week (23-24 February) host a Traditional Medicine Summit which will serve as a platform for stakeholders in traditional medicine sector to meet with the Department and discuss how to advance and formalize sector into the national healthcare system.
The summit is part of the resolutions taken at the level of the World Health Organization, African Union as well as Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) to integrate traditional medicine into health systems.
According to the WHO, around 80% of the world’s population is estimated to use traditional medicine, and traditional medicine is the first port of call to treat many diseases.
WHO has developed several documents to be used as guidelines or tools for integrating traditional medicine in the health system of member states, such as the WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2014 – 2023 which South Africa form part.
Conservative research estimates that there are between 200 000 and 300 000 traditional health practitioners in South Africa, and they provide health care services to the people alongside the Western Medicine practitioners.
Members of the media are invited to join the summit scheduled as follows:
Date: Thursday, 23 -24 February 2023
Venue: Birchwood Hotel and Conference Centre- Boksburg
Time: 09h00 – 15h00
