It nourishes the Yin of Liver and Kidney, especially enriching Liver Blood; it's deep purple/black whose juice blood-reddens your fingers when you pick it.

The discussion begins at 1hour and 51 minutes into the 3-hour show and lasts about 8 minutes.

Very worth listening to to get a sense of the balance of argument and the stances of governments.

This is relevant also for countries outside the EU, particularly at the present time Canada and South Africa.

It will be available for 6 more days.

Tonight on BBC Radio 5 Live's Stephen Nolan “Feisty topical phone-in debate” show, between 10.00pm and 1.00am UK time (9.00pm and 12.00am Harare/Pretoria time), one of the topics being argued about is the efficacy and benefit of herbal medicine. Historian Michael McIntyre, Chairperson of the EHTPA has agreed to take part in the debate with sceptical pharmacologist  Professor David Colquhoun and listeners will be invited to call in with their own views. The herbal medicine debate will be on at about 11.00pm, so tune in at least a little before that.

If you miss the live event, there's still a chance to hear it

After the event you can listen to the programme for up to 7 days by visiting
http://www.bbc.co.uk/5live/programmes/schedules

Evidence or what?

At the heart of the debate is bound to be the question of "evidence".  The real question, however, is "What is evidence?"  For many establishment figures it can be an unquestioned point of view based on narrowly defined parameters, with all else being "lies".  For others evidence is seen as much more complex and organic, bringing with it the trusted experience of "evidence by consensus".

The Pill

So you've tried some sensational herbal pill which carried fantastic claims and one or a number of certain scenarios happened:

The slightest Google search for weight loss nowadays will bring up a long list of pills that are said to be safe for people wanting to lose weight.  A question I am sometimes asked is: "Are the herbs in this list of ingredients all safe?"

The last time that herbal medicine was placed in jeopardy in the UK was in 1994 when the Government's plans to "harmonise" the UK Medicines Act of 1968 with the main European Medicines Directive (then called Directive 65/65 EEC). This, in effect, threatened all UK herbalists and their suppliers with being driven out of business on January 1st 1995 when the new EU regulations came into force.

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There is one kind of treatment non-compliance which has very positive implications.  All that has to be done in this case is to  milk the positivity out of the non-compliance and put it to good use.

How can non-compliance be good?

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