Letter from Lhasa: Traditional Tibetan medicine gains new lease of life in modern production plants

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by Liu Zhoupeng

LHASA, May 13 (Xinhua) -- I recently visited a famous Tibetan medicine production plant in southwest China's Xizang Autonomous Region to interview Phurtsamjor, a frontline pharmacist and national model worker.

The plant has a history of more than 300 years and was formerly a medical college near the Potala Palace in the regional capital Lhasa. It is now called Ganlu Traditional Medicine located at the Lhasa economic and technological development zone.

Stepping into a plant producing mysterious traditional Tibetan medicine for the first time was truly impressive and quite different from what I had imagined.

In my mind, I envisioned a scene of individuals dressed in traditional Tibetan attire, using ancient pharmaceutical instruments like stone mortars, copper pots and bamboo baskets to prepare medicine from rare herbs such as Chinese caterpillar fungus and saffron within a hidden workshop.

Clearly, reality was quite different. Upon arrival, we were instructed to remove our coats, unload our bags and equipment, don shoe covers, hoods, masks and white coats, and wrap our phones in plastic before undergoing a thorough series of disinfection procedures at the entrance.

We then entered the medicine production zone, where a narrow white corridor was flanked by different workshops on both sides. Everyone here wore full-body suits: yellow for those in the pharmaceutical workshop and green for the packaging staff. We journalists wore white suits for a temporary visit.

When I met the interviewee Phurtsamjor at the packaging workshop, she was busy inputting data on her computer, filling out material requisition forms and retrieving the packaging materials for the latest batch of the product -- Renqing Mangjue.

Renqing Mangjue is a famous Tibetan patent medicine that I had tried before. It tastes a little bitter and is quite effective in alleviating stomachache.

As I listened to the subtle hum of machinery, I realized that the standardization level of production had reached considerable maturity.

I was also told that employees in the packaging workshop in the past could only pack the medicine by hand, with a daily output of 3,000 balls, one ball per bag. In 2021, the workshops introduced machines, which can pack 38,000 balls per day and only need three workers.

Phurtsamjor has garnered acclaim for her meticulous work involving record keeping and statistical analysis. She said every detail of drug production is related to people's health and safety, so she could not afford any negligence.

In 2023, the plant produced 75.79 tonnes of products, raking in an operating income of nearly 240 million yuan (about 33.2 million U.S. dollars), with year-on-year growth of 41.98 percent and 15.83 percent, respectively.

Once, during a visit to the Tibetan medicine hospital in Nang County in the city of Nyingchi, I learned from Yeshe, the hospital director, that Tibetan medicines were traditionally made in large balls, requiring grinding into powder and brewing, which is a cumbersome and unpalatable process. However, modern plants now produce Tibetan medicines in convenient forms such as small balls or prepared oral liquids, significantly enhancing ease of consumption.

According to a white paper, Xizang is home to 49 public institutions of Tibetan medicine, and 94.4 percent of township health centers and 42.4 percent of village health clinics in the region offer Tibetan medicine services as of early 2022. Tibetan medicines are now being produced on a commercial basis, and the production of Tibetan medicine has been scaled up, standardized and regulated. Tibetan medicine and therapies are also included into the region's comprehensive public healthcare system.

Interestingly, a colleague from Beijing asked me to purchase some Renqing Mangjue. Another colleague of mine, who previously worked in Lhasa, regularly buys Tibetan medicine for her family in Shandong Province.

These instances illustrate the increasing popularity and widespread adoption of traditional medicine, not only in the Tibetan region but also among people from other parts of China. Enditem

(Edited by Lyu Qiuping)

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