# Traditional medicine Source: https://spiritfold.com.au/Traditional_medicine Published by the Australian Spiritual Alliance on Spiritfold, licensed CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. [](https://spiritfold.com.au/index.php?title=File:New_Edition_with_Supplemental_Annotations_of_The_Inner_Canon_of_the_Yellow_Emperor._Su_wen_WDL11409.jpg&filetimestamp=20261014130740&)A Yuan dynasty edition of the Su wen, part of the ancient Chinese medical text Huangdi nei jing (The inner canon of the Yellow Emperor). Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons **Traditional medicine** is the World Health Organization's term for systems of health care and well-being, written down or handed on by other means, that grew from experience in many different historical and cultural settings and are distinct from, and older than, biomedicine.[1] The term covers many separate traditions rather than one practice: 170 of WHO's 194 Member States have reported the use of herbal medicines, acupuncture, yoga, indigenous therapies and other traditional systems.[1] ## Description ### The WHO definition WHO describes traditional medicine as made up of practices, skills, knowledge and philosophies, and says it continues to evolve alongside science from its origins in experience. In WHO's account it places weight on remedies drawn from nature and on whole-person, individual approaches that seek balance between mind, body and environment.[1] WHO distinguishes medicinal products, such as herbal medicines, from non-medicinal therapies such as yoga and acupuncture, whose practice varies widely.[1] ### Traditional, complementary and integrative medicine WHO now groups traditional medicine with complementary and integrative medicine under the label "traditional, complementary and integrative medicine" (TCIM). Its strategy for 2025–2034 updated the definitions of traditional and complementary medicine and added a definition of integrative medicine: an interdisciplinary, evidence-based approach that combines biomedical knowledge with traditional or complementary knowledge and practice.[2] ### Systems and texts Some traditional systems are written down in classic texts, and others are passed on orally. Writing in the WHO *Bulletin*, WHO staff note that UNESCO has listed Indonesia's jamu wellness culture, yoga from India, and traditional Chinese acupuncture and moxibustion as intangible cultural heritage, and has placed the Four treatises of Tibetan medicine, China's *Huang di nei jing* and the Korean *Donguibogam* on its Memory of the World register.[2] Australia's medicines regulator also notes that some traditions have been recorded by people from outside the culture they came from, while others, especially those of smaller and more local groups, are not well documented and rest on knowledge handed down by word of mouth.[3] Several traditions have their own pages on Spiritfold. The TGA names traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine and Western herbal medicine as traditional paradigms;[4] see [Acupuncture](https://spiritfold.com.au/Acupuncture), [Cupping](https://spiritfold.com.au/Cupping) and [Qigong](https://spiritfold.com.au/Qigong), [Ayurveda](https://spiritfold.com.au/Ayurveda), and [Western herbal medicine](https://spiritfold.com.au/Western_herbal_medicine). WHO lists yoga and acupuncture among non-medicinal traditional therapies;[1] see [Yoga](https://spiritfold.com.au/Yoga). ## Scope ### What it includes - Systems of health care with their own practices, skills, knowledge and philosophies, whether written down or not[1] - Products, such as herbal medicines, and practices without medicines, such as yoga and acupuncture[1] ### What it is not - **It is not one system.** WHO recognises the diversity of these practices across the world's countries.[1] - **Long use is not proof.** WHO says an evidence-based approach, establishing efficacy and safety through rigorous scientific testing, is crucial even for practices used for a long time.[1] WHO staff write that, despite wide use, comprehensive data on safety and effectiveness are limited, and in a WHO survey 101 of 106 responding Member States named a lack of research data as a key barrier.[2] - **A traditional claim on a medicine label is not a TGA approval.** Listed medicines are not individually assessed before sale, are not "approved" by the TGA, and the TGA has not assessed whether evidence supports their permitted indications.[3] ## Traditions and lineage ### WHO's role The 1978 Declaration of Alma-Ata formally recognised the part traditional medicine plays in primary health care, and the 2018 Declaration of Astana reaffirmed the place of traditional knowledge and traditional medicine in universal health coverage.[2] WHO's work responds to requests from countries for evidence, data, standards and regulation.[1] WHO has issued three strategies on traditional medicine, for 2002–2005, 2014–2023 and 2025–2034.[5] The latest was adopted by the Seventy-eighth World Health Assembly in 2025, after the Assembly asked for it in 2023 and WHO consulted Member States, experts and others.[5][6] Its four objectives are to strengthen the evidence, ensure safety and regulation, bring TCIM into health systems, and make the most of its value across other sectors.[6] In 2022 WHO set up the Global Traditional Medicine Centre in India as a hub for knowledge, innovation and partnerships.[1] ### Growth in national policy WHO staff report that 90 of the 106 Member States answering WHO's third global survey had national policies on traditional, complementary and integrative medicine in 2023, up from 25 in 1999, and that 116 Member States reported frameworks for regulating herbal medicines, up from 65.[2] ### Traditional knowledge and Indigenous rights The strategy's authors note that the misappropriation of traditional knowledge raises concern for the rights of Indigenous Peoples. The strategy calls for traditional medical knowledge to be properly documented, with attention to the ethics of these practices and to protecting those rights.[2] ## Context ### Within Spiritualism Spiritfold has found no published source linking traditional medicine with Spiritualism. ### In Australian Spiritualism Spiritfold has found no published source linking traditional medicine with Spiritualism in Australia. ### A Spiritualist perspective Traditional medicine is not one practice but many, each belonging to the people and culture that shaped it, and a Spiritualist teacher would meet each with respect rather than treat them as a single thing. None of them is part of Spiritualism, and each stands on its own. That difference calls for care. A member trained in one of these systems should offer it under its own name and keep it separate from spiritual healing in a church or circle. A member who is not trained in it should not borrow its language or its remedies. And whatever the tradition, the advice is the same: no promises of cure, and anyone who is unwell keeps seeing a registered health practitioner. ## Traditional medicine in Australia ### Traditional medicines as therapeutic goods In Australia, medicines such as Ayurvedic and traditional Chinese medicines are classed as complementary medicines, and generally have to meet the same standards of quality and safety as other medicines.[7] The Victorian Government's Better Health Channel lists traditional medicines, including traditional Chinese, Ayurvedic and Australian Indigenous medicines, among the products the TGA treats as complementary medicines.[8] The TGA treats "listed" medicines as low risk and does not evaluate each one before it is entered on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods, so they may only use low-level indications chosen from a set list.[4] Some of those indications rest on scientific evidence and others on evidence of traditional use.[3] ### What "traditional use" means For a traditional indication, the TGA requires that the medicine or ingredient has been an accepted part of an established tradition of medicinal use for more than three generations, or 75 years.[3] The indication must name the tradition it comes from, both in the register and on the label, using a "traditional context qualifier" such as "Traditionally used in Western herbal medicine".[4] Some permitted indications use the terms of a particular tradition, such as traditional Chinese or Ayurvedic medicine, so that people familiar with that tradition can use the medicine appropriately.[4] The TGA says the expectation that a medicine works as its indications describe applies whether the evidence is scientific or traditional.[3] ### Practitioners Traditional systems are practised under different rules. Chinese medicine is a registered health profession: since 1 July 2012, anyone using a protected title such as Chinese medicine practitioner or acupuncturist has had to be registered with the Chinese Medicine Board of Australia.[9] See [Acupuncture](https://spiritfold.com.au/Acupuncture) for more on how that registration works, and [Ayurveda](https://spiritfold.com.au/Ayurveda) and [Western herbal medicine](https://spiritfold.com.au/Western_herbal_medicine) for training in those traditions. ## Safety and good practice WHO says that safety in any kind of health care depends on the practitioner's competence, the quality of products, good communication and sound regulation.[1] It encourages countries to monitor the safety of traditional medicine products, and to set up systems for reporting problems with them alongside those for conventional medicines.[1] In 2005 the TGA issued an advisory after research found toxic heavy metals in some Ayurvedic herbal products from India and Pakistan sold in the United States, and noted that the United States regulates these products very differently from Australia.[7] Better Health warns that relying on complementary therapies alone can delay diagnosis and medical treatment, that complementary medicines can interact with prescription and over-the-counter medicines, and that people should tell their doctor about any complementary medicine or therapy they use.[8] ## Common questions ### What does the World Health Organization mean by traditional medicine? WHO uses the term for health systems, written or unwritten, that arose from experience in particular cultures and existed before biomedicine.[1] It now speaks of traditional, complementary and integrative medicine together, or TCIM.[2] ### What does "traditionally used" mean on an Australian medicine label? It tells you the claim rests on evidence of traditional use, not scientific evidence, and it names the tradition, for example Western herbal medicine.[4] The TGA requires that use within that tradition goes back more than three generations, or 75 years.[3] ### Has the TGA checked that a traditional medicine works? Not for listed medicines. They are not individually assessed before sale, and the TGA has not assessed whether evidence supports their indications.[3] ### Is traditional medicine the same as complementary medicine? WHO treats them as related but separate, and groups them with integrative medicine as TCIM.[2] In Australian product regulation, traditional medicines are counted among complementary medicines.[7] ## Related modalities - [Ayurveda](https://spiritfold.com.au/Ayurveda) - [Acupuncture](https://spiritfold.com.au/Acupuncture) - [Western herbal medicine](https://spiritfold.com.au/Western_herbal_medicine) - [Qigong](https://spiritfold.com.au/Qigong) - [Cupping](https://spiritfold.com.au/Cupping) - [Tai chi](https://spiritfold.com.au/Tai_chi) - [Yoga](https://spiritfold.com.au/Yoga) ## References 1. World Health Organization. ["Traditional medicine"](https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/traditional-medicine). Questions and answers, 28 November 2025 (accessed 14 October 2026). 2. Wong, Yuk Ming Alice, Sangyoung Ahn, Aditi Bana, Pradeep Kumar Dua, Rudi Eggers, Shyama Kuruvilla et al. ["Policy implications of WHO's Global traditional medicine strategy 2025–2034"](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12578523/). *Bulletin of the World Health Organization* 103, no. 11 (2025): 715–721. doi:10.2471/BLT.25.293414 (accessed 14 October 2026). 3. Therapeutic Goods Administration. ["Supporting claims and indications for listed medicines"](https://www.tga.gov.au/resources/guidance/supporting-claims-and-indications-listed-medicines). Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Published 1 October 2001; last updated 1 June 2022 (accessed 14 October 2026). 4. Therapeutic Goods Administration. ["Permitted indications for listed medicines"](https://www.tga.gov.au/resources/guidance/permitted-indications-listed-medicines). Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Published 1 March 2018 (accessed 14 October 2026). 5. World Health Organization, Global Traditional Medicine Centre. ["Traditional Medicine Strategy 2025–2034"](https://www.who.int/teams/who-global-traditional-medicine-centre/traditional-medicine-strategy-2025-2034) (no date shown; accessed 14 October 2026). 6. World Health Organization. [*Global traditional medicine strategy 2025–2034*](https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240113176). Geneva: WHO, 2025. ISBN 978-92-4-011317-6 (publication page; accessed 14 October 2026). 7. Therapeutic Goods Administration. ["Ayurvedic medicines"](https://www.tga.gov.au/alert/ayurvedic-medicines). Safety advisory, published 27 April 2005 (accessed 14 October 2026). 8. Better Health Channel. ["Complementary therapies – safety and legal issues"](https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/ConditionsAndTreatments/complementary-therapies-safety-and-legal-issues). Department of Health, State Government of Victoria. Reviewed 28 February 2014 (accessed 14 October 2026). 9. Chinese Medicine Board of Australia. ["Registration and how to apply"](https://www.chinesemedicineboard.gov.au/Codes-Guidelines/FAQ/Registration.aspx). Ahpra. Page reviewed 30 September 2025 (accessed 14 October 2026). ## Further reading - Therapeutic Goods Administration. ["Permitted indications for listed medicines"](https://www.tga.gov.au/resources/guidance/permitted-indications-listed-medicines). Australian Government, 2018. - Wong, Yuk Ming Alice et al. ["Policy implications of WHO's Global traditional medicine strategy 2025–2034"](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12578523/). *Bulletin of the World Health Organization*, 2025. - World Health Organization. [*Global traditional medicine strategy 2025–2034*](https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240113176). Geneva: WHO, 2025. - World Health Organization. ["Traditional medicine"](https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/traditional-medicine). Questions and answers, 2025.