The Ghana Federation of Traditional Medicine Practitioners Associations (GHAFTRAM) has urged the government to include approved herbal medicines on the list of approved medicines on the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS).

The federation expressed concern that the traditional medicine sector had received very little attention from successive governments.

The President of GHAFTRAM, Prof. Samuel Ato Duncan said this at the commemoration of the 22nd African Traditional Medicine (ATM) Day and 25th Traditional Medicine Week celebration in Ghana held in Accra.

The President of GHAFTRAM pointed out that in spite of the fact that approved herbal medicines had not been included in the list of approved medicines on the NHIS, they shared the surname “medicine” with conventional medicine, and emphasised that “the two are twin brothers and must be raised together.”

"You cannot raise one and leave the other and blame him for not doing well. The traditional medicine industry needs serious support and attention," he stated.

Prof. Duncan, who is also the President-General of COA Research and Manufacturing Ltd, said it was as a result of this that the executive of GHAFTRAM was pushing for the Green Gold Agenda, a programme that sought to harness the potential of traditional medicine through research to develop them to international standards for the global market as another commodity for the country.

He said the Green Gold Agenda was expected to generate over $5 billion annually for the country.

That figure, he said, was more than the proceeds from cocoa.

Fastest growing industries

Prof. Duncan observed that the herbal medicine industry was one of the fastest growing industries in the world due to factors such as consumer preference for natural products, the perception that natural products were effective with minimal to no side effects, rising costs of synthetic pharmaceutical drugs and budget cuts for modern health care.

He said the global herbal medicinal products market was expected to be valued at $177.65 billion by 2029.

The President-General of COA Research said in Asian countries, including China, India, Singapore, and Malaysia, a significant portion of their total economic revenue was generated from the traditional medicine industry.

"It is based on these significant contributions of traditional medicine that the World Health Organisation (WHO) developed and launched the WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2014–2023, which also emphasised the integration of traditional and complementary medicine to promote universal health care and to ensure the quality, safety and efficiency of such medicines," he stated.

Despite the above statistics, Prof. Duncan expressed regret that in Ghana, the traditional medicine industry had received very little attention from successive governments.

The President of GHAFTRAM, therefore, urged the government to consider listing approved traditional medicines on the NHIS.

"On this note, I would like to call on everyone here and all stakeholders to join hands together to make traditional medicine our own," he stated.

Other initiatives

Aside from the Green Gold Agenda, Prof. Duncan mentioned that GHAFTRAM would establish a firm administrative structure to run the federation and ensure that every traditional medicine practitioner in Ghana was captured in its database and registered with GHAFTRAM.

He said the federation would help traditional medicine practitioners to standardise their medicines and operations as well as establish a research committee made up of representatives from reputable research institutions and regulatory bodies.

In addition to the above, Prof. Duncan said the federation would establish a Traditional Medicine Development and Research Fund to support research and development of traditional medicine in Ghana, and also look for funds internally and externally to support the industry.