At the 1st International Symposium on Integrative Pediatrics, held in São Paulo, SP, Brazil, on November 22 and 23 last year, the representative of the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization in Brazil, Dr. Socorro Gross Galiano, representing the Director of PAHO/WHO, Dr. Carissa Etienne, and the President of the Brazilian Academic Consortium for Integrative Health, Dr. Ricardo Ghelman, signed a Technical Cooperation Agreement for joint work between both entities.
The importance of establishing this cooperation with CABSIn is based on the fact that it is a collaborative network of researchers, universities, and teaching and research institutions from all over Brazil, with the ability to contribute to the quality knowledge and scientific evidence of Traditional, Complementary, and Integrative Medicine (TCIM).
In addition, CABSIn has a close relationship with the TCIM Network of the Americas, which today brings together more than 15 countries, where the experience developed in Brazil can inspire the creation of similar consortia in other countries.
According to the Consortium President, Dr. Ricardo Ghelman, “the importance of the Brazilian network is that MTCI researchers will be able, through collaborative projects within the framework of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of the UN 2030 Agenda, to contribute especially to health promotion and to the control of chronic noncommunicable diseases. “The Consortium organizes these actions through its thematic committees such as Pediatrics, Oncology, Pain and Natural Products and projects in association with BIREME/PAHO/WHO, research institutions and the Ministry of Health, such as the Mapping of the Clinical Evidence in Integrative Practices and the Mapping of Integrative Practices in Hospitals. We hope that with this Technical Cooperation Agreement we can develop new projects, committees and products of public health interest ”
According to Diego González, BIREME Director, “The Latin American and Caribbean Center for Health Sciences Information has an important role in establishing this Cooperation Agreement for its mission of democratizing information, knowledge and evidence, and specifically for its articulating and facilitating role of the TCIM Network of the Americas, in the development of the TCIM Virtual Health Library, and for its work in developing products that support the effectiveness of these integrative practices, such as evidence maps. ”
According to Dr. Socorro Gross, Representative of PAHO/WHO, “this Agreement is a dream come true because it formalizes cooperation with the Consortium to place integrative, complementary and integrative practices in health services with robust scientific evidence. There are many challenges that we must face; we are sure that in the framework of this alliance there will be many victories that we will achieve”.
All the work on this topic is aligned with the World Health Organization’s 2014-2023 Traditional Medicine Strategy, which aims to support member states to: take advantage of the potential contribution of TCM to health, well-being and people-centered health care; and promote the safe and effective use of TCM through regulation and research, also by incorporating products, professionals and practices into health systems, as appropriate.
The 1st International Symposium of Integrative Pediatrics, during which this Cooperation Agreement was signed, was born as an initiative of the Coordination of the Thematic Committee of Integrative Pediatrics of the Brazilian Academic Consortium for Integrative Health, in collaboration with the Pediatrics Unit of the Children’s Institute, Faculty of Medicine of the University of São Paulo, Hospital das Clínicas (HC-FMUSP), in association with the IBC Med Faculty and the Transatlantic Club, with the presence of representatives of the Ministry of Health and other academic figures from pediatrics and integrative medicine, from Brazil and other countries.