My grandmother, my mother, and my aunts were trained to treat us…and we are developing an integrated system of integrative medicine

The Minister of Health and Community Protection, Dr. Ahmed bin Ali Al-Sayegh, said that 70% of his prevention and treatment in his early childhood was based on popular traditional medicine, noting that this personal experience represents an essential part of our health history since childhood.

He added during a session entitled “Is investing in integrative medicine a government priority?” Within the activities of the World Government Summit: “My grandmother, my mother, and my aunts were all trained to treat us and make us stronger. We did not have cars to take us to clinics, even if they existed, so it was always better and faster for us to receive treatment from them, including treating fractures and burns.”

The Minister of Health said: “We are developing an integrated system of traditional integrative medicine supported by the latest scientific and methodological methods so that it becomes an essential part of prevention and a healthy lifestyle in the UAE.”

He continued: “We will work, through the Emirates Council for Integrative Medicine, to develop a legislative framework that supports licensing and safe practices for integrative medicine to ensure patient safety. We need to build our capabilities, and this includes integrating integrative medicine programs into basic education, increasing community awareness of these practices, and developing scientific research focusing on population health priorities.”

Al-Sayegh pointed out the importance of combining ancestral experience with modern treatment methods, saying: “Our ancestors had treatments for most diseases, and today we want to bring them back in a scientific and safe way. We hope that international cooperation will reflect this heritage, while benefiting from the expertise of our partners and neighbors.”

The Minister stressed the importance of preserving the traditional customs of pregnant women and the postpartum period, saying: “We have a clear system for pregnant women that includes nutrition, exercise, massage, and a period of forty days after birth to restore health and vitality. These skills are beginning to be lost, and we must preserve them and train the new generation in them.”

He stressed: “We are reconsidering this heritage, and we are working to train young people to learn from the elderly while adopting scientific foundations, because our way of life in the Emirates has proven its effectiveness over the centuries in a difficult environment, and traditional medicine was an essential part of the survival of our people.”