Citation, extracts and a comment from me below.
CITATION: BMJ 2026; 393 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2026-100062 (Published 30 June 2026)
Cite this as: BMJ 2026;393:e100062
Correspondence to: C A Philips abbyphilips@theliverinst.in
EXTRACTS
Use of traditional medicine must follow evidence of efficacy and safety
The BRICS economies, including India and China, committed to further collaboration to integrate traditional medicine in healthcare, at a meeting in May 2026. The meeting was held by India’s Ministry of Ayush (ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy, unani, siddha, and homeopathy). Globally, interest in complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) — that is, unproved, non-standard interventions — is surging, with the market projected to reach $359bn by 2032.
In December 2025, a multilateral declaration endorsed the World Health Organization’s Global Traditional Medicine Strategy 2025-2034, aiming for “universal access to safe, effective” traditional medicine. This proposes integrating CAM into national health systems and universal health coverage through strengthening evidence, tightening safety regulation, expanding workforce, and building a global library of traditional knowledge.2
Lower standards of evidence
Despite claiming evidence must precede integration, the strategy also allows member states to fund and integrate CAM before standard efficacy and public safety data exist, which is ethically and methodologically indefensible. WHO contradicts its promise of universal scientific rigour by lowering evidentiary standards: the strategy endorses observational and “real world data” designs “appropriate to the unique characteristics” of CAM instead of the standard randomised controlled trials.
As global interest in CAM grows, so does an “infodemic” of health misinformation and the exploitative sale of unproved interventions. The stakes are enormous: patient harm, displacement of effective care, and eroded trust in health institutions...
WHO’s definitions risk legitimising unproved practices from the prescientific era...
WHO’s strategy insufficiently distinguishes CAM as traditional knowledge for hypothesis generation from validated knowledge that is ready for integration. An ideal CAM strategy should mandate efficacy and pharmacovigilance, including adverse event reporting. Existing large CAM workforces worldwide should be retrained in evidence based priorities for primary care, including screening, vaccination, identifying chronic disease, and maternal health. Research funding should prioritise independent trials, with negative results published. WHO’s CAM library should document harms alongside claims of benefit, while disclosing commercial conflicts of interest. And WHO’s messaging must remain unequivocally aligned with scientific consensus — a proved tool against misinformation that mixed messaging undermines.
Globally, CAM is the predominant healthcare option for billions of indigenous, rural, and underserved people, likely reflecting constrained access to evidence based care instead of informed choices. The ethical response is not uncritical endorsement of CAM but to expand access only to interventions that withstand standard scientific scrutiny as effective and safe. Patients everywhere deserve nothing less.
COMMENT (NPW): The apparent WHO shift towards support for complementary and alternative medicine has been noted on HIFA frequently over the past few years. There will be a range of views about this. My personal view aligns with this editorial. At the same time, I am aware that WHO is indeed pushing for better research and evidence on CAM. And almost all of us would agree that is a priority. The question is what will be the quality and quantity of such research; to what extent will this enable a transition of unproved, non-standard interventions to interventions of proven value; and can we envisage an abandonment of ineffective and potentially harmful interventions?
Best wishes, Neil
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org