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Ghana: Western Medicine VS. Traditional Afrikan Medicine
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Public Agenda (Accra)
OPINION
16 May 2008
Posted to the web 16 May 2008
Dr. Kwame Osei
Based on previous news reports that have warned Ghanaians to be very circumspect about some of the western drugs they are taking, we thought it appropriate to examine the issue of western medicine and traditional medicine.
It is apparent when one walks through the major cities of Ghana that there is a plethora of Pharmacy shops that are supplying Ghanaians with an array of prescriptive medicines for various diseases.
However, in the days of our grandparents, there was not even a single pharmacy shop, so why is there now an abundance of these shops and what has been the situation that has led to these pharmacy shops?
Because of the plant based vegetarian diet of our ancestors and the holistic lifestyle they practiced, coupled with a strict adherence to the laws of nature/creation our ancestors did not need the services of a pharmacy shop.
Their diet was their medicine. Indeed when they did fall ill, they used natural traditional remedies in accordance with biblical teachings as outlined in the book of Genesis which talks of the tree of life. In actual fact in the days of our ancestors there was no such thing as western medicine!
Scientifically speaking the root of what is called western medicine is actually traditional Afrikan medicine.
Using traditional and natural medicines coupled with a vegetarian/vegan diet and a holistic lifestyle, our ancestors were able to live to in some cases more than 300 years of age.
The advent of enslavement and colonialism saw a change in the dietary habits and lifestyle practices of Ghanaians that has resulted in the current health crisis that is facing the country.
Therefore as a result of changing our diets from a vegetarian one to a diet high in starch, meat, salt, sugar and saturated fats and from changing our Afrikan-centered holistic way of life to a western type lifestyle particularly in the major cities, Ghanaians are now suffering from aliments like cancers, diabetes, strokes, heart attacks, cardiovascular disease and so forth.
It is precisely because of these diseases and the abandonment of natural traditional remedies that Ghanaians are now resulting to western medicine hence the increase in pharmacy shops.
However despite the abundance of these outlets the truth of the matter is that western medicine is very dangerous for Ghanaians to take.
Firstly, there are a lot of fake western drugs/medicines that are on the market that have been made with an unusually high dosage of chemicals when taken can cause serious side effects including death.
To buttress this point BBC Radio Five Live made a documentary on 19 September 2004 entitled "How safe are your drugs". The documentary highlighted the point that most of the drugs sent to Afrika are counterfeit drugs and are entirely useless.
The programme then went on to state that ALL the anti-malaria drugs that are sent to the West Afrika sub region are fake and therefore useless and intimated that the fake drugs industry is worth a whopping $30bn a year.
Secondly the normal western drugs are made with synthetic chemicals that have been added to the natural Afrikan plant meaning that the natural effectiveness of the plant is eroded and as such making the medicine/drug useless in curing disease - in many cases it adds new diseases.
Thirdly western drugs/medicine are not good for Ghanaian people because fundamentally Ghanaians have got different genes from European people.
What many Ghanaians do not appreciate is that western medicine is made using the genes of Europeans which differ greatly from that of Ghanaians. Ghanaians have a significant genetic difference than European people that is never mentioned in western science/medicine.
This significant difference is a chemical compound called Melanin. Ghanaians along with their Afrikan brothers are a highly melanated people. Melanin is the chemical compound that causes pigmentation in the skin; in essence it is what makes our complexion the different shades of Black.
Therefore taking western medicine, made with synthetic drugs destroys or slows down the ability to produce melanin. Therefore this melanin deficiency makes Ghanaians twice as more addictive to certain drugs than European people.
Scientifically speaking, melanin is in every human being; however Afrikans possess the most melanin with Europeans possessing very small amounts of melanin which in the case of Albino Whites is virtually nil.
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This lack of melanin is why European people burn in the sun, because they do not have the protective layer of melanin to protect them from the sun's ultra-violet rays - this is why they invented sunglasses so that the sun could not damage their non-melanated eyes.
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As a native westerner whose heart and soul belongs to Africa, I wholeheartedly agree with the author. The pharmaceutical industry has encouraged the health professions to sell the public on the "illusion" of these Western "remedies with side effects" for profits only--not with the intentions to cure.
Have we not learned as African and people of the Diaspora from the lessons of the Tuskegee Project in America? In this project, black men were infected and used as human experiments to see the acute stages of the veneral disease syphyllis. If Westerns can be so morally inhumane, cruel and act with... [Read Full Text]
There is absolutely no evidence for any of this. Silly, badly written and dangerous stuff. Obviously counterfeit medicines should be removed by consistent government action. There is no 'Western' medicine, just as there is no 'alternative'; there is medicine that works and medicine that does not.
Why, if medicine does not work, has Ghanian life expectasncy risen consistently over the past 50 years?
http://globalis.gvu.unu.edu/indicator_detail.cfm?IndicatorID=18&Country=GH
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