Washington DC, October 17, 2024 - The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) concluded the regional consultation on the World Health Organization (WHO) Traditional Medicine Strategy draft, 2025-2034, which gathered comments, suggestions, and contributions from national health authorities of 16 Member States, as well as from multiple social actors connected to traditional, complementary, and integrative medicines (TCIM) in the Region.
The consultation, which also included public servants, members of Indigenous Peoples and Afro-descendants, healthcare providers, and the academia, showed a significant level of acceptance for the proposed components, objectives, and strategic directions, receiving more than 80% acceptance.
In addition, the consulted parties emphasized the importance of including frameworks to recognize and make visible the traditions of Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendants, and other ethnic groups in the region as culturally appropriate, socially relevant, and their right to autonomy and the protection of their knowledge and traditional practices, in alignment with PAHO's Policy on Ethnicity and Health (2017) and the corresponding Strategy and Action Plan (2019-2025).
PAHO consolidated a regional report including recommendations from all stakeholders involved in the consultation, to be considered in the final draft of the new strategy to be presented to the 156th session of the WHO Executive Committee and subsequently submitted to the 68th World Health Assembly in May 2025.
The importance of TCIM in Primary Health Care (PHC) has been recognized since the Declaration of Alma Ata in 1978 and reinforced in the Declaration of Astana in 2018, as well as in other international instruments. Therefore, WHO has previously published two editions of its Traditional Medicine Strategy: the WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2002-2005 and the WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2014-2023. At the 66th World Health Assembly in 2023, the validity of this last Strategy was extended, and the development of a new version for the period 2025-2034 was requested.
