Author: PTI
Publication: The New Indian Express
Date: January 12, 2006
URL: http://www.newindpress.com/Newsitems.asp?ID=IE320060111085756
In a major step towards promoting Ayurvedic
studies in the US and tapping its $40 billion herbal market, India has cleared
the proposal to send experts to teach Ayurveda in 10 American medical colleges.
"Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has extended
his full support for the proposal and we are in touch with officials of Ayurveda
Department in this regard,'' said Navin C Shah, a senior medical representative
of Indian doctors in the US.
Shah, who met Singh on Tuesday and is scheduled
to meet senior bureaucrats to work out the proposal, said that under the arrangement,
the Indian Government would finance two Ayurveda professors for the course.
Shah said a short course in Ayurveda would
create further interest in the learning and use of the ancient Indian system
of medicine to benefit patients in the US.
Shah, a leading urologist in Washington and
the former president of the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin,
representing 41,000 doctors, said there existed a vast $40 billion herbal
market in the US.
"In India, the Ayurveda sector is only
worth $1 billion but the Americans spend over $40 billion annually on herbal
medicines and products,'' he said, adding that awareness about Ayurveda would
enable India to tap the vast market in the US.
