By Eric Brand

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog about the organic herb situation in China. As we’ve mentioned before on this blog, about 50% of the product on the Chinese herbal marketplace by weight is wild-crafted, and the rest is cultivated. About 150 herbs are exclusively available in their cultivated form, with an average combined production of about 300,000-350,000 metric tons per year.

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Malia's note:

After reading a recently published article through the New York Times entitled, Does Your Language Shape How You Think?, Shawn and I have recently reopened and rehashed a discussion that has continued off and on since our days as OM students. Coincidentally, as this made its way into our conversations during our daily commute into work last week, the essay that follows below, written by Valerie Hobbs, L. Ac. and Campus Director of SWAC Boulder, also found its way into our discussions from its recent publication in The Luo Down, SWAC's quarterly newsletter. In it, Valerie beautifully sums up our thoughts on translating Chinese TCM terminology into English TCM terminology and finally into layperson's terms for full disclosure. Enjoy.

Glorious Nonsense
By Valerie Hobbs, L. Ac.

Do you know what Alice actually said upon reading the Jabberwocky? She said, “It seems very pretty…but it’s rather hard to understand!...Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas – only I don’t exactly know what they are!”

When I’m gazing into the looking glass of Chinese medicine, I have to admit that my experience of the practice of it is much like Alice describes: my head is full of ideas, and sometimes I don’t know exactly what they are.

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By Eric Brand

China is a large country with a diverse ecosystem and a long history of trade in medicinal products. China’s early development of a common written language and efficient transportation routes allowed herbs to be employed in regions far from the original production areas. Over time, certain regions came to be known for producing certain herbs, and the best quality of a particular product was often thought to come from one particular region.

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By Eric Brand

The other day we had a guest blog that brought up the issue of Chinese medical terminology. Some people feel strongly about the issue of Chinese medical terminology and others could care less about it. Does it really matter?

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By Eric Brand

Human placenta, known in Chinese medicine as Zi He Che, is not permitted for use as a dietary supplement in the United States. The official FDA position on Zi He Che is that human placenta is not a food or a dietary ingredient. They say that it can transmit disease and thus cannot be included in dietary supplement products. The disease transmission theme aside, it appears that the FDA actually has a very bizarre interpretation of why placenta can't be considered as a dietary substance.

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