Acupuncture Gains Wide Following In Hong Kong

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32077, 27 August 1969, Page 5

Acupuncture Gains Wide Following In Hong Kong

(N.ZP.A. -Reuter —Copyright) HONG KONG. Business is improving for doctors in Hong Kong who practise the ancient Chinese method of acupuncture to cure a variety of ailments. Reports from mainland China of miracle cures by inserting needles into afflict-; ed parts of the body have! added to the small band of. devoted acupuncture followers in Hong Kong. New customers range from' housewives to high-powered executives, who seek the ■ needle treatment for illnesses ranging from arthritis to! headaches. Widely publicised accountsfrom China told of miraculous cures of the blind, deaf, dumb and lame by Chinese; army medical units using the! treatment. In recent months numerous] articles have been carried by i the official Chinese press, re-

porting how thousands of people previously considered incurable had been restored : to full health through acupuncture. The New China News Agency reported that one army unit used acupuncture to treat successfully over 1000 blind, deaf or paralysed i patients in less than two years, in spite of having never previously studied acu- . puncture. i The Chinese Communist Party weekly, “Peking Review” also told recently of how Chinese doctors, sent to] African countries with development teams, bad demonstrated the curative powers of ! acupuncture. In Tanzania 10 ■ previously blind people had ■been cured, and in Mauritania a young deaf and dumb boy had his speech restored by nine sessions of needle treatment Acupuncture as an Oriental medical technique dates back oyer 4000 years, when] needles of stone and polished ■ animal bone were inserted

into parts of the body to cure illnesses.

The art was widely practised throughout China until the Ching Dynasty, from 1644 to 1911, when the emperors decided their bodies should not be pierced, and took to Western-style medicines. Today, acupuncturists usually use copper, or a similar highly refined metal, for their needles. Traditionally the Chinese believe that the insertion of the needles releases harmful vapours which give rise to disorders. Patients say the treatment is completely painless, but it has remained popular mainly with the Chinese—although some Western doctors have been known to use it. The president of the Hong Kong College of Chinese Acupuncture, Professor Lok Yee-Kung, says it can cure many serious illnesses —including typhoid, cholera, pneumonia, rheumatism and migraine.

Asked if he though that acupuncture’s new-found popularity was due to reports of miraculous cures in China, Professor Lok said there was nothing miraculous about them—he himself had cured many people suffering from paralysis—including his 80-year-old mother—by acupuncture.

But so far none of the colony’s 12 or so acupuncturists have claimed success in treating the blind and the deaf, and newspapers in Hong Kong are openly speculating on the possibility of an invalids’ exodus for treatment across the border.