India fast becoming Mecca of homeopathy.

February 8, 2006

The Times of India.(Courtesy Dobbie606 of Alternative-medicine-forum.)Homeopaths' sweet successShobha JohnSunday, January 29, 2006 NEW DELHI: The times they are a-changin. Remember the corner-shop homeopath with his strange-smelling vials and assorted bottles of medicines? Well, he's got amakeover. And how. The new homeopath is a globetrotter and raking in the moolah, sometimes as much as Rs 30,000 a day.IT/ITES, medical tourism, animation and now, homeopathy India was never so shining, so global. And experts predict that in the next 5-10 years, India will also become the hub for clinical research in homeopathy. As for China, it doesn't stand a chancehere, say experts.For the new homeopath, the world is a stage. Diwan Harish Chand, chairman, Central Council

for Research in Homeopathy, and former president of the International Homeopathy Medical League, has travelled to 70 countries; his patients come from as far and wide as the US, Canada, Kenya, Singapore, Australia, Germany, West Asia and Pakistan."India can be the Mecca of homeopathy with huge number of practitioners estimated at 0.3 million," he says.Kolkata's Parimal Banerjee too is a visiting physician for his 20,000 global patients. Of them, about 4,000 are from the US."Over Rs 1 lakh worth of medicines are sent abroad from my lab every month," he says. The demand is so high that 25 doctors attend to health-related querieson computers at his clinic.The growing faith in homeopathy worldwide is evidenced by a phone call that Delhi-based doctor Kalyan Banerjee received from China. Last year, he was invited by a 59-year-old terminally-ill cancer patient to Beijing after surgery proved futile.He's much better now, he says. "In fact, China

hardly has any homeopaths. India should seize the opportunity and send more doctors there," he says.Banerjee has some 10,000-15,000 foreign patients and has been to the US, Europe, Australia and the UK, treating myriad ailments related to kidney, skin and lungs. He also treats allergies and multiple sclerosis.Another homeopath talks about curing a 92-year-old German of pneumonia after antibiotics failed to do the trick. Banerjee sends medicines abroad for some 150patients every month.These tech-savvy homeopaths also do consultation on phone and through the Net. One doctor's site asks patients to attach a cheque along with the proformafor consultation, medicines or shipping.The rates are nominal. Some charge a flat consultation rate of Rs 1,000 for SAARC countries and Rs 2,000 for others. Meanwhile, teams from Russia, US, France andItaly have evinced interest in clinical research, especially for cancer and various viruses."Already

37 centres in India are carrying out research. There's also interest in using homeopathy for animals," says Chand.India also has the largest homeopathic infrastructure: institutions as well as drug manufacturing centres. And these can be effectively utilised globally, says,R K Manchanda, deputy director, homeopathy, Delhi government.The Delhi government's free website delhihomeo.com is also quite popular with patients abroad. "Queries come from all over. We also get students from Nigeria, US,Nepal and Sri Lanka," he says .The government, says Chand, should make it easier for foreign students to study here and for our scientists to train in research centres in Europe and US.Plus, says Manchanda, homeopathic institutions should gear up qualitatively to provide clinical research. Sweet dreams are made of this, after all.©Bennett, Coleman and Co., Ltd. All rights

reserved. "Our ideal is not the spirituality that withdraws from life but the conquest of life by the power of the spirit." - Aurobindo.

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