Many traditional healers are often victimised for human sacrifices, upheaval and deaths mainly because they are linked to witchcraft practices. Consequently, the government decided to regulate and protect their activities. Dr. Nelson Musoba, a programme consultant with the Private-Public Partnership in Health (PPPH) talked to Bamuturaki Musinguzi on the need for this intervention. Below are the excerpts:

At what stage are the principles of the Proposed Traditional Medicine Bill 2002?

Well, originally the bill had been written and advanced to parliament but it could not proceed because the policy was not ready and that is why we had to back track and make sure the policy document is ready before we go ahead with the principles. So we could say that the principles are ready and just need to be tabled in parliament through cabinet.

What are the major highlights of the Bill?

They include regulation, control of the practice and practitioners and environmental conservation. The policy makes sure that the environment is not depleted of both the herbs and animals from which the products are gotten. It also caters for training and curriculum development because healers are coming up with apprenticeships at their places of practice and I think this needs to be regulated.

How does the law propose to protect the intellectual property rights that have been passed on for generations through families, clans and communities?

In the draft policy, there is a provision on the protection of intellectual property rights. This has been one of the major concerns of the healers and they fear that once they expose the contents of the herbs, it will be taken away. On the task force, we have lawyers who are advising on how this will be handled.

Why has it taken the government long to develop a policy to regulate the activities of traditional medicine practitioners?

The collaboration between the government and the private sector has been a process. The private sector includes the private-not-for-profit (missionary hospitals and NGOs with facility based and non-facility based), and private-for-profit (individual practitioners in clinics or hospitals, and the traditional complimentary medicine).

In the process of building a partnership and because of the already established framework and similarity in the missions (policy), the government chose to begin with the private-not-for-profit followed by private-for-profit.

And currently, we are developing the policy for traditional and complimentary medicine. So it is not that it has taken long but this had to be phased out and traditional and complimentary medicine being the more complex and diverse sector had be dealt with last.

What is the difference between witchcraft and traditional healers and how will the law draw the boundaries?

Witchcraft is a very negative practice and concentrates on doing bad to a person while traditional and complimentary medicine looks at bringing good health to an individual.

There is the Witchcraft Act, which spells out clearly how the trade should be dealt with.

The draft policy lays down who a traditional healer is, the accreditation, licensing, control, regulation and how one gets into healing. And the purpose of the policy really is to ensure that a statutory council comes into place so that it is able to stamp out the current bad practices of human sacrifices and mutilation, many of which we get to know of from the media.

Why is it that witchcraft has painted the entire practice as evil?

It is common that negative things are over pronounced and one bad thing will destroy all the good done and that is why witchcraft has taken a large share of the bad advisement of the industry.

There are many good things that healers do but they may not have been very strategic in marketing themselves because it is believed that over 60 percent of the population will either contact healers as the first point before going to a health facility or resort to them when they have failed to get a cure from the health facility. And if indeed the practice were bad, then we would not be having such a large number of the population relying on traditional healers.

How is the government going to bring traditional medicine on board the main health delivery systems?

First of all, the traditional healers are found in the communities so they can be trained on methods of hygiene, used as conduits of other community health programmes (pass on messages that do not need a high level technical knowledge), offer safe practice and discourage them from things that endanger health.

The intention to work with traditional healers is both to strengthen them in what they are doing and also to get them to work on the government programmes.

What is the importance of traditional medicine?

Well, the importance is that most of the western medicine is derived from herbs and found to be effective. We have the Natural Chemotherapeutics Laboratory where the value of the drugs are tested and found to be effective. Conceptually, it appeals to the population and they understand it more easily that the western medicine.

The traditional healers tend to have very close contact with their patients and are good at counselling with the psychology element. So it has its good and superior aspects that have to be promoted and upheld, and that is why we think you cannot just throw it away. It existed even before western medicine came here and our great grandfathers relied on traditional medicine.

How will the policy ensure that the practitioners adhere to the ethical code?

Right now, there are associations for different traditional healers, which have mainly played the role of registration of the healers than anything else. Now these associations could be strengthened and trained and they themselves can weed out the bad apples. The government can work with them to ensure they discourage bad practices, look out for those coming on board and the government would only come in to supervise through the local governments.

Shall we see the government starting up a school or institute of traditional medicine for purposes of training and research among others?

It does not have to be the government. Some healers have set up training institutions. Now one has to go in and ensure that they have the criteria for recruitment, credible training curriculum, and they need to work with the government to ensue that the graduates can develop a career along the traditional medicine practice.

They need to be guided and follow standards as well as do research because a lot of research can only take place if you have higher centres of learning. Our task force has experts from the Makerere University School of Medicine and the Para Medical School to ensure and guide the process of capacity building within traditional and complimentary medicine.

Countries like China have made great strides in this line. Do we see Uganda following the same because traditional has proved to be far safer?

We have to be careful of course when we speak about some of the alternatives and complimentary practices like the Chinese medicine. It can very easily overshadow our own practices.

So that is why we think the policy is very important to make sure that the positive traditional medicine practices that are indigenous to Uganda do not go underground but are instead maintained and carried forward but along side some of the alternatives and complimentary practices like the Chinese. Yes, we think that if the policy comes into place, we will preserve and even develop through training.

Maybe we shall see our traditional and complimentary medicine occupying a place alongside western medicine in future so that when one visits a hospital, he can be asked whether he would prefer to be seen by a traditional medicine healer or western trained doctor like it is in places like China.

Do you know of any countries in Africa that have made good use of their traditional medicine practice through sound policies?

Yes, Nigeria, Malawi and Ghana have policies on traditional and complimentary medicine and we are looking at some of their documentations though we have generally followed the World Health Organisation guidelines to be able to come up with our own.