More than 2,000 years ago, Chinese medicine was exchanged and promoted along the ancient Silk Road, and became an important part of trade and commerce between China and foreign countries. Today, Chinese medicine has spread to 196 countries and regions around the world, accelerating its pace of "going global" and significantly increasing its influence, making a positive contribution to the enhancement of mutual understanding among civilizations, the promotion of people-to-people communication and the maintenance of human health and well-being.
"Chinese medicine treatment is very effective and I am impressed by the excellent medical skills of Chinese doctors." In the Mediterranean Regional Center for Traditional Chinese Medicine in Paola, Malta, local resident Anton Merak told this reporter that he fell and injured his right shoulder last year, unable to lift his right arm, he came to the Mediterranean Regional Center for Traditional Chinese Medicine as soon as possible, and after nearly six months of acupuncture and massage physiotherapy, the situation has obviously improved. "I came into contact with Chinese medicine in 1996, when I suffered from severe migraine headaches and recovered my health after receiving treatment here." On this visit, Merak also brought some souvenirs to express his gratitude to the Chinese doctors.
In Malta, the Mediterranean Regional Center for Traditional Chinese Medicine has been a well-known medical and training institution for traditional Chinese medicine, and in 2008, the Center set up a Traditional Chinese Medicine Department at MaterDei, which was the first time that traditional Chinese medicine was introduced into the national hospitals of the European Union member states in the form of an independent department. Since 1993, the Chinese government has sent 19 batches of medical teams to Malta to work here, treating about 250,000 patients.
Maltese President Vella said the contribution of Chinese medicine treatment is invaluable to Malta's medical sector and patients. Feng Hua, head of the 19th China-aided Malta medical team, said the center also received patients and TCM enthusiasts from other European countries such as Italy, France, Portugal, Spain, Britain and Hungary, making it a window to showcase the image of TCM in Europe.
China's medical aid to foreign countries has a history of more than half a century, and Chinese medicine has played an important role in medical aid to foreign countries. Acupuncture and moxibustion is one of the longest-supported departments in Algeria over the past few decades; in Cambodia's Kausma Sino-Cambodian Friendship Hospital, long queues often form in front of the TCM outpatient clinic opened by China's China-aided Cambodian TCM medical team; in Kuwait, TCM treatments such as acupuncture and moxibustion, cupping, and sticking of acupressure points are popular in the local community, and fitness methods such as Taijiquan and Eight Trigrams boxing have been welcomed; in Guyana, TCM acupuncture and moxibustion have been used to treat tens of thousands of patients; the Guyana Medical Team has also actively promoted TCM courses such as acupuncture and tuina into local campus ......
Last April, a group of 12 people, including Ms. Mafusa of Zimbabwe, traveled from Bulawayo, the country's second-largest city, to the China-Zimbabwe Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine Center in the capital city of Harare, hoping to receive Chinese medicine treatment. The two cities are more than 400 kilometers apart, and they left a day early, traveling a whole day and night. Mafusa introduced, she had been in the center to receive acupuncture treatment, the pain in back and other parts have been greatly relieved, so she recommend Chinese medicine to family and friends, and finally leading to this trip.
"For foreign-aided TCM doctors, patients' recognition of TCM is the biggest achievement." Hu Sha, a doctor at the China-Zimbabwe TCM Acupuncture Center, said the center offers a number of special TCM treatments such as acupuncture, tuina, cupping, physiotherapy and herbal medicine, and outpatient clinics have been booked until August this year.
In recent years, China has deepened its educational cooperation with many countries in the field of Chinese medicine.
Enter the needle, move the needle, keep the needle, exit the needle ...... a series of steps finish in one go. In a practical class at the University of Malta's TCM Center, trainee Adriana Balzan is working with her classmates to practice acupuncture. In 2015, the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine and the University of Malta cooperated to establish the TCM Center and offer a Master's Degree Program in Chinese Medicine and Chinese Culture. The program lasts two years and covers TCM diagnosis, acupuncture and moxibustion, meridians and acupoints, and acupuncture treatment. Balzan is a nurse at MaterDei, after one and a half years of study, she has mastered the knowledge of meridians and acupoints, and also practiced cupping, moxibustion and other items. She said, "This study has made me more competitive in the job market. I look forward to entering the Chinese Medicine Department after graduation and continuing to improve my Chinese medicine skills."
"People with different physiques need different diets and living habits, just like different plants need to adapt to different growing environments" "The human meridians are like highways, the acupoints are crisscrossing intersections, and the moving cars represent Qi and blood" ...... In a classroom at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa, acupuncture teacher Hu Zijing is explaining the theoretical knowledge of Chinese medicine to her students using easy-to-understand analogies.
Since it officially opened at the University of Johannesburg in 2020, acupuncture has become one of the most popular, and most difficult programs to apply to, says Hu Zijing. The program enrolls about 50 students each year, and the number of applicants has grown from 1,285 in 2020 to 7,102 in 2022. Michelle, a South African girl, was one of the first graduates of the University of Johannesburg's master's degree program in acupuncture, and has stayed on as a lecturer and furthered her education. Michelle has used acupuncture to treat frozen shoulder, stroke, and acute asthma, and has helped a number of patients reduce their pain. She said, "Over the years, we have truly experienced the wonders of acupuncture through clinical practice. I hope to continue my studies so that more people can be exposed to TCM acupuncture."
Last year, Shafi Eze, a graduate of the Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia Raman, joined a TCM clinic in Kuala Lumpur. "Many people in modern society are in a state of sub-health, and TCM can play a good role in improving it." He told the reporter that over the years, his mother's migraine has been relieved through Chinese medicine treatment, and his own sequelae from meningitis have been significantly reduced, and his determination to learn Chinese medicine has become stronger.
Zheng Jianqiang, Director of the Center for Traditional and Complementary Medicine at Laman University Hospital, introduced that the Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine at Laman University has been open for more than ten years and currently has more than 160 students, with an average annual employment rate of 97% for TCM graduates. Raman University has established cooperative relationships with a number of Chinese traditional medicine universities and Chinese medicine hospitals in China, and many students have the opportunity to go to China for internships. The university has also established cooperation with Guangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, where the Chinese side sends experts to provide training to local Chinese medicine practitioners, and Malaysian Chinese medicine practitioners also have the opportunity to go to China for further training.
The Federal University of Goiás, Brazil, is the first Confucius Institute for Traditional Chinese Medicine in Latin America, offering courses such as Introduction to Traditional Chinese Medicine, Tuina, Acupuncture, etc., and regular monthly lectures related to Chinese culture and traditional Chinese medicine. In October last year, the university and Hebei University of Traditional Chinese Medicine opened a Chinese medicine clinic center. Camilla, dean of the university's School of Nursing, said, "The ongoing training of our team by Chinese experts marks an important step toward quality and comprehensive care."
Located in the small northeastern German city of Stralsund, the Latz Pharmacy has been selling Chinese medicine formula granules since 2019. At this pharmacy, there are also automated Chinese medicine formula granule blending machines customized by Chinese pharmaceutical companies for the German market, one of which ensures constant temperature and humidity of the granules, while the other can automatically blend the formula granules according to the doctor's prescription, mixing them into the clinical formulas needed by patients.
China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Medicines and Health Products data show that in the first half of 2023, China's exports of traditional Chinese medicine products amounted to 2.915 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 3.63% year-on-year, and traditional Chinese medicine products have become an important variety of medicine "going global" at the moment. In recent years, China has built 31 Chinese medicine service export bases, which have become international comprehensive service platforms for Chinese medicine to benefit people from all over the world.
In recent years, Cyrus Baedo, Fuxing Pharma's product manager for antimalarials in sub-Saharan Africa, has been actively promoting a series of antimalarial products, including artesunate for injection. Artemisinin-based medicines inspired by traditional Chinese medicine texts and integrating China's scientific research strength have made significant contributions to malaria prevention and treatment in many African countries, and have helped many places in Africa to realize the transformation from high malaria-endemic areas to low malaria-endemic areas in a short period of time.
Over the years, China has strengthened international cooperation in traditional Chinese medicine with the countries along the "Belt and Road" and solidly pushed forward the construction of the Healthy Silk Road: 30 overseas centers of traditional Chinese medicine have been built with Russia, Thailand, Hungary and other countries; more than 100 types of proprietary Chinese medicines have been registered and listed in the countries along the Belt and Road, the cooperation documents on traditional medicine have been signed with 14 co-built countries, and 8 co-built countries have supported the development of traditional Chinese medicine within their national laws and regulations ......
Last year, the International Clinical Trial Registration Platform for Traditional Medicine, which was set up and operated by the China Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine and other institutions, was certified as a first-level registration organization of the International Clinical Trial Registration Platform of the World Health Organization. This is the world's first clinical trial registration platform themed on traditional medicine, which will be conducive to enhancing the transparency of information at the source of clinical trial design of Chinese medicine, promoting the modernization of Chinese medicine, and facilitating the development of Chinese medicine in the world.
Busuttil, former Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Centre for Traditional Chinese Medicine in the Mediterranean Region, who has served in the Maltese Ministry of Health, WHO and other positions, said: "Traditional Chinese medicine is the crystallization of human wisdom, and has a unique efficacy in the treatment of a number of diseases. The fact that traditional Chinese medicine has been recognized and praised by the local people since its entry into Malta is a good illustration of this. The WHO previously included traditional medicine originating from TCM in the International Classification of Diseases, and the value of TCM is increasingly recognized." Busuttil is promoting the development of Chinese medicine scientific research projects in Malta, hoping that the official launch of the project will promote cooperation in Chinese medicine between the two countries and bring more benefits to the local people.