Ayurveda for the west

摘要

The correspondence by Patwardhan et al. on the neglect of Ayurveda healing is right on target. As Chairman of a non-profit organization and its Science Advisory Committee, which consists of a dozen world-class scientists, including several members of the National Academies and H. P. Duerr, successor to Einsten and Heisenberg as Director of the MPI-Physics, we are also keen to rectify this amazing omission. We have started to change the attitude of the US community - referred to in the correspondence - regarding Whole Person Healing (WPH) or Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) to be more aware of the Indian traditional healing practices on a scale similar to the amazing acceptance of Chinese acupuncture (15,000 certified practitioners) and now, Qi Gong masters. It is true that yoga and meditation have fully penetrated Western culture. Meditation is of course universal, the distinctively Indian herbs and advanced health practices are hardly known at all, as Patwardhan et al. have pointed out.