Kumasi, March 9, GNA - Mr Karmar Agyapong, Director of Mpaebo Herbal Clinic, formerly Peace Herbal Clinic, has called on the government to do more to promote herbal medicine in the country. He said the situation where inadequate attention was given to traditional medicine was unhelpful to the national campaign of quality health care for all.
Speaking to the Ghana News Agency in Kumasi on Monday, Mr Agyapong said many herbal medicine practitioners suffered undue delays and frustrations before getting certification for their drugs. He said there were instances where samples of traditional medicine sent to the country's research institutions to determine their potency or otherwise ended up not being tested at all, let alone getting a feedback on the test.
Mr. Agyapong who claimed he had cured some patients suffering from HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis, Malaria and Leukemia, called for an effective collaboration between herbal medical practitioners and orthodox medicine.
He said an HIV/AIDS drug that he developed in 2004 and was sent to the Biochemistry Department of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi had proved to be effective for the treatment of the deadly disease. He said he also found a cure for Leukemia and that four patients were currently on the drugs.
He said one of the patients who reported of HIV/AIDS and Leukemia had been cured after taking his drugs for six months. "This underscores the need for traditional medical practitioners and their counterparts in the orthodox practice to work hand in hand to improve health delivery," Mr. Agyapong added. 9 March 09
