Dear CDC,
This is the American Association of Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture (AACMA) from California, the largest professional organization of Chinese medicine and acupuncture in the United States [1].
With the rapid spread of COVID-19 pneumonia around the world, everyone is anxious about the lack of specific drugs and vaccines. According to news reports and published papers[2-4] in China where COVID-19 pneumonia first appeared, clinicians have explored and applied the method of integrating traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and Western medicine to combat the disease. Under the premise of safety, the application of TCM was closely examined to be safe and thoroughly monitored. It was implemented in more than 75% of confirmed patients in China[5]. The integrated method has relieved the clinical symptoms of patients, shortened the course of the disease, and improved the clinical cure rate. Among these promising effects, the achieved effect on preventing the disease from mild to severe is particularly worthy of attention and reference. The sixth edition of the New Coronavirus Treatment Protocol issued by the National Health Commission of the PRC also includes some TCM prescriptions[6] which have been proven to be successful. Furthermore there is no reported adverse event caused by using TCM in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. WHO experts and officials also highly appraised the achievements of China’s measures in containing and treating the COVID-19 after their recent field visit to China[7].
In summary, we recommend that CDC consider including TCM in the development of guidelines for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. We believe this treatment modality, with thousand years of practice in maintaining people’s health and fighting off various epidemics including the current one, in the most populated country of the world, could also help along with our conventional medical system to treat COVID-19 and to prevent it from turning into an epidemic here.
Besides Chinese herbology, TCM also includes acupuncture[8], acupressure, tui na (massage), cupping, tai chi, qigong, and other non-medicine measures that have been legally used in the United States for a long time in health maintenance, disease prevention and treatment. It can help people strengthen their physique and hence to have a balance immune system which plays a very critical role in coping with the disease.
There is a group of experienced TCM acupuncturists in our association. We are willing and ready to assist CDC to conduct work on the potential situation with reference to the encouraging integrated treatment method which China has adopted to combat the COVID-19.
Thank you very much for your attention. Please contact us at aacmaus@gmail.com. We wish all of us in the United States, and the world, health and peace.
AACMA
References:
[1] www.aacmaonline.com
[2] http://apps.who.int/trialsearch/Trial2.aspx?TrialID=ChiCTR2000029461. (ChiCTR2000029400/ChiCTR2000029418/ChiCTR2000029517/ChiCTR2000029518/ChiCTR2000029814/ChiCTR2000029789/ChiCTR2000029461/ChiCTR2000029558/ChiCTR2000029578/ChiCTR2000029601 /ChiCTR2000029747/ChiCTR200002977/ChiCTR2000029778, etc.)
[3] http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2020-02/14/c_138784403.htm
[4] https://mobile.twitter.com/globaltimesnews/status/1230701483240259586
[5] http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2020-02/17/c_138792163.htm
[6] https://www.chinalawtranslate.com/diagnostic-and-treatment-plan-6/
[7] https://youtu.be/u_QjnaQDWEI
[8] https://www.acupuncture.ca.gov