Regional News of Friday, 9 January 2004

Source: GNA

Herbal doctors asked to be resourceful

Kumasi, Jan 9, GNA- Dr Amen Bonsu, Managing Director of Amen Scientific Herbal Centre in Kumasi, has called on herbal doctors to be very resourceful and adopt practices that would help to develop herbal medicine in the country.

He said improvement and development of herbal and traditional medicine in the country could serve as an alternative where orthodox medicine falls short of supply.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency in an interview on herbal medicine in Kumasi on Thursday, he said it was time herbal doctors scientifically categorised their drugs for the cure of different diseases.

Dr Bonsu stressed that the practice where herbal doctors are unable to categorise their products for the treatment of one or two ailments but claim to have the drug for the cure of several diseases was unprofessional.

He called for government's support for the development of herbal medicine by allowing locally manufactured drugs to be used along side orthodox medicines at the hospitals.

Touching on HIV/AIDS and other Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs), Dr Bonsu said daily reports on such cases at his clinic, was on the increase.

He, therefore, advised parents, especially Muslim parents to encourage their daughters to maintain the culture of virginity before they marry.

This, he said, would save them from early marital problems and the HIV virus.