UNIVERSAL CREDIBILITY OF UNANI SYSTEM OF MEDICATION Unani system is popular in different parts of the world with different names. In India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and South Africa it is known as Unani Medicine or Unani ṬTIBB as it originated from Greece. In Iran, it is called as TIBB Sunnatī (Traditional Medicine), in Pakistan as Eastern Medicine, and in China as Uyghur Medicine. In some countries, it is also known as Islamic Medicine or Arab Medicine. In Kuwait, Unani System of Medicine is practised as Islamic Medicine and an Islamic Medicine Centre is established. Most of the knowledge about Unani Medicine is available in Arabic, Persian and Urdu languages in ancient classical literature, which is inaccessible and rarely understood to the common man, researchers and administrators. Documentation of this traditional knowledge on Unani Medicine has become imperative to preserve it and to save it from misappropriation and granting patents on non-original innovations. In 1999, the Department of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (AYUSH) in collaboration with Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Ministry of Science and Technology constituted an inter-disciplinary Task Force for establishing a Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) in 2001. It provides information on traditional knowledge existing in the country, in languages and format understandable by patent examiners at International Patent Offices (IPOs), so as to prevent the grant of wrong patents. The TKDL, thus, acts as a bridge between the traditional knowledge information existing in local languages and the patent examiners at IPOs. As on April 2013, the TKDL contains details of 274,020 medicinal formulations from the texts of Indian systems of medicine, of which 154,015 formulations pertain to Unani System of Medicine. The project unit of TKDL also monitors patent applications filed in different patent offices and if required submits third party objections. Till April 2013, 144 patent applications have been cancelled/withdrawn or amended at various patent offices including United State Patent & Trademark Office, European Patent Office, Canadian Patent Office, United Kingdom Patent & Trademark Office, Australian Patent Office and Indian Patent Office.
Posted on: Thu, 12 Sep 2013 06:33:16 +0000