The legendary Shennong tasted a hundred herbs In the current discussion about the superiority or inferiority of Chinese and Western medicine, we can often see such a common viewpoint: those who exist in the Chinese medicine books of Chinese medicine, in the history of thousands of years has been practiced countless times, there are countless cases of healing, countless patients to tell how to be rescued, countless Chinese medicine practitioners described how to save the patient in colorful ways …… The above “facts” fully demonstrate that Chinese medicine is effective, and the effectiveness of Chinese medicine does not need to be confirmed by modern medical tests. Is this true? A large number of canonical records, thousands of years of practice, countless cases, numerous personal accounts, enough to prove the effectiveness of Chinese medicine? Not enough, far from it. Even modern medicines that have been proven to be effective may have their knowledge subverted in the course of continuous practice. Let alone almost no modern scientific means of testing Chinese medicine? Let’s talk for a moment about how modern medicine has subverted the understanding of drugs with proven efficacy. The first example is aspirin. Aspirin was first marketed as the most famous antipyretic and analgesic, and then the medical profession went on to discover that aspirin had extraordinary therapeutic effects on a wide range of other diseases. Since the 1980s, aspirin has been found to prevent cardiovascular disease and gastrointestinal tumors, and studies have shown that regular use of aspirin can improve the prognosis of colorectal cancer. In the United States, doctors’ prescriptions for colorectal cancer patients often include aspirin. Is there a need for such a well-researched drug to continue to be studied and tested? Yes, there is. You see, here comes a new discovery. This document, “Aspirin therapy extends life only in selected colorectal cancer patients,” published in 2012, suggests, “New research suggests that the population benefiting from (aspirin) is limited to carriers of the PIK3CA variant gene, which number about 20 percent of all colorectal cancer patients, and that it may be ineffective in the rest of the patients, and may even lead to gastrointestinal ulcers or gastric hemorrhage. ” With this example we can see that further research on aspirin, a drug that clearly improves the prognosis of colorectal cancer, is necessary: for patients with the PIK3CA variant gene, aspirin is very necessary and improves the prognosis extremely well, whereas for 80% of patients with colorectal cancer aspirin is not only ineffective but also risky. By using similar scientific tests, physicians are able to improve clinical care by providing more accurate clinical regimens for their patients. In fact, similar studies are being conducted on virtually any drug that enters the clinic. This example is, after all, a positive one, an expansion of an already clear efficacy study, and it is followed by a second example where clinical application of what was thought to be an effective drug was investigated with poor results. Hypertension is a very common disease, and some data say that there are more than 200 million hypertensive patients in China. Hypertension requires lifelong use of antihypertensive drugs to minimize the risk of cardiovascular events. A large class of antihypertensive drugs currently in use are calcium channel blockers (CCB), which occupy roughly half of the antihypertensive drugs in the Chinese region. Taking this type of drug, can understandably lower blood pressure and improve symptoms …… What are the results of the ongoing test? The first generation of CCBs are basically short-acting CCBs, and in the 1990s, studies of short-acting calcium channel blockers showed that short-acting calcium channel blockers, especially short-acting nifedipine, were the most obvious, and that their long-term use would increase the morbidity and mortality of cardiovascular disease, and that the U.S. FDA warned of dangers in the use of short-acting nifedipine. What was supposed to be the main goal of treatment to minimize the risk of cardiovascular events has resulted in risks. These reports have led to a major debate about the safety of CCBs. Currently, first-generation CCBs have largely been replaced and are not recommended for use in hypertensive patients. Long-acting CCBs such as nifedipine controlled-release tablets, on the other hand, have not been found to have these types of problems and are still widely used. Moving on to the third example. Many people have a natural affinity for herbs and the following drug was first extracted from a plant, a large number of doctors have proved its efficacy, it has been widely used in the clinic for a long time, and it is still the first-line drug, and almost no one doubts its efficacy, so is it not necessary to test the drug again? No. Digoxin, a drug extracted from the digitalis plant, has been used in the treatment of heart disease for more than 200 years and is probably the oldest drug used in the treatment of heart failure. Widely used in clinical practice, digoxin is still the foundation drug in the treatment of heart failure, and in most cases is one of the first-line drugs of choice. There are countless doctors who can provide testimony to its efficacy with a clear conscience. There should be nothing wrong with such a drug, right? Here comes the test. Data from a 2002 study showed that digoxin reduced the percentage of heart attack patients who were hospitalized, but did not reduce patient mortality. A patient-specific gender analysis also showed that digoxin actually increased mortality in female patients. This study naturally led to another clinical debate. But the fact that a drug that has been used for many years, that has been shown to be clinically effective in heart failure patients, and that countless doctors have been able to testify to its efficacy with a clear conscience, may turn out to increase the mortality rate in some (female) patients, shows that there should be ongoing research and testing of any drug. I’ll give you another example of a much longer history, documented in canonical texts and other historical records, with countless cases, many testimonials, and medical records of doctors who used it as a regular treatment for a long period of time. For many people, this is proof enough of its efficacy. But what is the truth? This example is bloodletting. Bloodletting is probably the most widely practiced therapy among the peoples of the world, and it has been practiced to a greater or lesser extent by all the peoples of the world. Bloodletting has been clearly documented for 2,000 years and was once popular in Europe, even being a regular treatment for doctors for a long time. In China today, there are still Chinese herbalists who use this therapy and swear by its effectiveness. Historically, this therapy has a large number of cases, countless people’s proof, and even particularly similar to Chinese medicine, bloodletting therapy has a theoretical basis. The theoretical basis of bloodletting therapy is derived from the ancient Greek medical saints Hippocrates and Galen, who said that human life depends on four bodily fluids: blood, mucus, black bile and yellow bile. The ancient Greeks believed that blood was dominant among the four humors, and Dr. Galen believed that blood was produced by the human body and was often “in excess”, just as the TCM school of nourishing Yin said “Yang is often in excess and Yin is often in deficiency”, TCM nourishes Yin, and the ancient Western doctors then bled the blood. However, there was finally a Scottish military doctor, Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton began to study this time-honored therapy in earnest in the early nineteenth century. “He put 366 sick soldiers evenly divided into three groups, three groups of patients suffering from similar severity of the disease, the treatment received is the same, the only difference is that two groups of patients do not bleed, a group of patients to receive the traditional bloodletting therapy, the results are not bloodletting of the two groups, respectively, there are 2 and 4 patients died, while receiving bloodletting therapy of the group even died 35 people. ” And multiple subsequent studies have proven the ineffectiveness and harmfulness of bloodletting therapy. These are examples of cases where the ideal state of affairs is basically met, where the maximum requirements are met. And Chinese medicine meet these? And let us take the most proud of Chinese medicine from the history of the canon, these Chinese medicine canon is really very complete, very credible? Here are a few examples from TCM texts: “Poisoning of pork. Burn the ashes of pig feces and take a square inch dagger with water. — “Wai Tai” Women’s hemorrhage. Burnt ashes of old sow’s feces, take three coins in wine. — “Li Lou Fang” Antidote to all poisons. Sow’s feces, take it with water. –Thousand Jin (“Blood in Urine in Pregnancy”): Take the clawed armor of a husband and burn the ashes, and take it in wine. –Ben Cao Gang Mu The confusion and disarray of our canonical records is evident in the Ben Cao, which is regarded as the supreme herb. Would anyone find this credible? Oh, some would say that I am attacking a point to discredit TCM. So I ask, is a canonical text with a large number of such accounts considered a credible account of sorts? Do they need to be scientifically tested? Well, they are canonical books, and whether the ancients were gods or mediocrities, after all, they have to be handed down and organized by modern people. Then take the latest version of the “Pharmacopoeia of the People’s Republic of China” 2010 edition now in use, and this about the Chinese medicine part, there is the use of flying squirrel feces in the formula, there is the use of heavy metals into the medicine, there is the use of human organs into the medicine, the use of the cheapest chemical sugar-lowering ingredients to maintain the efficacy of thirst-quenching pills …… must be reminded of that this is documented with standards. This is already a big step forward from the most traditional, widely known and widely used but without any quality standards in Chinese medicine, the herbal tonics. Does anyone else think that the canon of Chinese medicine is complete and credible? As for the current quality control of herbal products, let alone: “Dangpi does not scrape the skin and draw out the heart, Bai Shao does not go to the old root, Banlangen does not go to the head of the root, Peach kernel and apricot kernel do not remove the skin, Sour date kernel contains a large number of shells, Maidong and Lotus Seed do not go to the heart ……” The fact is, the The results of various tests on Chinese medicine are dismal. Beijing People’s Liberation Army General Hospital (301 Hospital) has tested more than two hundred kinds of Chinese herbs, none of which has a hypoglycemic effect (Chen Ningqing, former vice president of the Chinese Academy of Military Medical Sciences, March 10, 2007, in the “science for the right to health” forum speech). And this is still the tip of the iceberg, we have spent a lot of manpower and material resources to study traditional Chinese medicine, but only a few results. Even so, there are still some people who will say: I just believe in Chinese medicine, I will use Chinese medicine, and I believe there will be a large proportion of effective treatments in it. In fact, the chances of screening effective drugs from Chinese medicine are very low. An example is the discovery of Artemisinin. In order to study anti-malarial drugs, Tu Youyou’s group collected more than 800 possible anti-malarial Chinese medicines, and the Yunnan group collected more than 4,300 single prescriptions and tested prescriptions of Chinese herbs, which is a huge amount; that year, China mobilized the whole country’s efforts and screened more than 40,000 kinds of compounds and herbs in five years (see another report: 3,200 kinds of Chinese herbs, and then Tu Youyou selected 640 of them among the 2,000 malaria curing prescriptions), before finally discovering artemisinin. , before finally discovering artemisinin. Either way, what are the chances that the numerous remedies provided by Chinese medicine practitioners and Chinese medical texts have not been put to use? Mr. Ark has a saying that I find very graphic: it’s basically about as efficient as taking a copy of the Flora of China and sifting through it one by one. In other words, you use Chinese medicine and traditional Chinese medicine treatment of malaria, the probability of really effective and casually turn “Chinese Botanical Journal” at once pointed to the probability of the word Artemisia. In fact, the probability of discovering an effective drug from the TCM texts is even lower than from the Flora of China, because: “Although Chinese medicine has traditionally used Artemisia annua to treat malaria, the kind of Artemisia annua used by Chinese medicine practitioners (also known as Artemisia annua) does not contain artemisinin, which has been proven to be ineffective in the treatment of malaria. Artemisinin is extracted from Artemisia annua (also known as Artemisia annua), which is in the same genus as Artemisia. Chinese medicine practitioners almost do not use Artemisia annua as medicine”, “Ge Hong recorded this recipe can really cure malaria, is also very doubtful. Artemisinin is almost insoluble in water (that’s why Tu Youyou used ether to extract it), soaking a handful of Artemisia annua in two cups of water (the Eastern Jin Dynasty’s “liter” was very small, and at that time, a liter was equivalent to about 200 milliliters nowadays, i.e., one cup), even if the Artemisia annua is used, it is unlikely to soak artemisinin that can reach the concentration of the pharmacology. ” This shows that for malaria alone, the probability of effective treatment using TCM is zero. The example of malaria is a bit extreme, but after so many years of testing Chinese medicine, what effective results have we actually gotten? Mr. Wan Yi has said that the contribution of Chinese medicine is probably artemisinin and arsenic for the treatment of leukemia, plus acupuncture for analgesia, and that is basically all that has been proven to be effective in Chinese medicine and Chinese medicine therapies. There are still some people who say, “I take Chinese medicine and feel that it is effective, and that is enough. Although this issue is already clichéd, I have to repeat that Chinese medicine often feels effective for the following two reasons: 1. Many illnesses can heal themselves, such as colds. In addition, many parents feel the headache of their children’s allergic asthma in children, and after a long period of treatment, with the growth of age, physical fitness, a lot of pediatric asthma patients to the age of 12 years old, especially after puberty, asthma symptoms will naturally reduce or disappear. And many parents in a long time after treatment, often lose confidence and turn to Chinese medicine, when the child’s symptoms improved, and the last use of Chinese medicine, many parents naturally think that the role of Chinese medicine. 2, placebo effect. Placebo effect in patients is a very common phenomenon. For many diseases, the patient to eat does not contain medicinal ingredients “placebo”, but let the patient mistakenly think that it is a drug, then, there will be a considerable portion of the patient will also have a therapeutic effect. It has been reported that “this effect occurs in about 35% of patients with physical illnesses and 40% of patients with psychiatric disorders.” The power of this effect is also illustrated by the following: “Before the invention of antimicrobials, physicians used to administer powders which they knew to be useless, and the patients thought they had hope. In some of these cases, however, the patients recovered miraculously, and in some cases even survived the “ghosts” such as bubonic plague and scarlet fever.” Currently, the mechanism of the placebo effect is undergoing in-depth research: “Although it is a placebo, why I eat before the disease does not get well, once eaten instantly effective? Bristol University researchers built a mathematical model, said that the start of the immune system is a very high energy consumption, from the evolutionary point of view, only when the environment is suitable to fight against the disease is cost-effective, so what medicine to eat on the good, far from being proof of effectiveness. Far from being proof of effectiveness. You have said that you feel effective when you take Chinese medicine, and that’s enough. But I must warn you that the risks of herbal medicine are more noteworthy. Typical ones are aristolochic acid, which is now better recognized and has been used in both the East and the West. Aristolochic is a herb that is found all over the world and was recorded in the pharmacopoeia as early as 300 B.C. We now have a clear picture of its hazards as a class I carcinogen. For this drug with a long history now we clearly understand its dangers. What percentage of traditional Chinese medicine contains aristolochic acid? Prof. Wang De-Rong of the Department of Public Health at National Taiwan University conducted a study in which he randomly selected 200,000 people from the Taiwan Health Bureau’s medication database for the seven-year period from 1997 to 2003, and found that 12% of the Chinese herbal medicines used during the seven-year period contained aristolochic acid, including at least 17 types of Guanmutong, Guangbaoji, Qingmuxiang, Tianxianteng, and Aristolochia. This study also found that 39% of these 200,000 people had taken herbs with aristolochic acid over the 7-year period. What else? Some materials say that “10 percent of the varieties of proprietary Chinese medicines contain cinnabar, and even worse, 20.32 percent of the varieties of pediatric proprietary Chinese medicines contain cinnabar.” In addition to this, there are aconite-containing epiphyllums, toxic toadstools, and so on and so forth. That’s still the ones that have been shown to have definite extremely toxic effects, so could there be similar time bombs in this large category of untested drugs? It’s hard to say, but it’s very likely. Finally, to summarize: 1, the development of science requires that even the industry has been proved to be effective drugs also need to continue in-depth research. 2, for those who are even “effective” drugs, it is necessary to continue in-depth research. 2, for those who even “have a complete record of books, clinical use for many years, there are countless cases, there are many people’s proof, there are cases of doctors, there are doctor’s testimony,” the scientific test often confirms its unreliability. 3, our Chinese medicine canonical records are confusing and untrustworthy, and our organization and transmission of the canonical records is not reassuring. 4. Numerous studies on Chinese medicine have not proved its effectiveness. 5, On the contrary, a large number of experiments have proved that a very large percentage of Chinese medicines have very definite toxicity. After reading this article, the following questions are no longer difficult to answer: 1, Chinese medicine need to be tested? 2, the ancient texts of the efficacy of the drug, reliable? 3. When a drug is proven to be harmful, should it be discontinued. I believe that any person who has given serious thought to the matter will have no difficulty in coming up with a rational answer.