For more than two years now, China has been promoting traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) as a Covid-19 treatment. President Xi Jinping wants friendly countries to give China’s herbal cures a chance. For example, the Chinese government has been sending traditional medicine specialists to Cambodia and supporting clinical trials in Pakistan, two countries that rely heavily on Chinese aid. Russia, meanwhile, has been selling Lianhua Qingwen, promoted as a Covid cure, since 2020. The medicine is also available in the Philippines and in more than 20 countries.
Lianhua Qingwen is just one of the traditional treatments officially endorsed by the Chinese government. The medicine became so popular it raked in about $6 billion for Wu Yiling, majority owner of Shijiazhuang Yiling Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd., the medicine’s manufacturer. Lianhua Qingwen made Wu one of the world’s 500 richest people.
A recent social media post, however, managed to erase about $2 billion from Wu’s $6 billion fortune. A Bloomberg report said the plunge in Yiling Pharmaceutical’s shares started on April 15, after Wang Sicong, the son of property billionaire Wang Jianlin, shared a video on Weibo, a Chinese Twitter-like platform, questioning whether the World Health Organization had ever recommended Lianhua Qingwen as a Covid remedy. That came after he called on social media for China’s securities watchdog to investigate Yiling.
Bloomberg said both posts were deleted, and Weibo later banned Wang because his account “violated related laws and regulations.” The following day, Yiling vowed to take legal action against defamatory statements and reiterated its Lianhua Qingwen has some “rare” adverse effects such as nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain.
From Bloomberg: “Debate over the efficacy of Traditional Chinese Medicine—or TCM—has intensified in recent weeks as the nation fights its worst outbreak since the early days of the pandemic. While the government has been promoting the remedies, they haven’t received the nod from regulators with global credibility, and the World Health Organization hasn’t approved or recommended the use of Lianhua Qingwen to treat Covid-19.”
The US Food and Drug Administration in 2020 sent at least six warning letters to companies selling Lianhua Qingwen and other TCM-based products purported to be Covid cures, telling vendors that the products were unapproved and misbranded drugs. Singapore’s Health Sciences Authority said in November: “To date, there is no scientific evidence from randomized clinical trials to show that any herbal product, including Lianhua Qingwen products, can be used to prevent or treat Covid-19. We strongly advise members of the public not to fall prey to unsubstantiated claims or spread unfounded rumors that herbal products can be used to prevent or treat Covid-19.”
Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at SOAS University of London, said the promotion of traditional Chinese medicine is about geopolitics, not science. “If TCM will be proven as an effective cure, I am sure the whole world will rejoice,” he said. “The problem is that there is no solid evidence that it is.”
Even China is not betting entirely on TCM. In February, the Chinese government approved Paxlovid, the first foreign pharmaceutical product for Covid to win acceptance from China’s regulators. Antiviral treatments, such as Paxlovid, are medications that are taken orally. Although they are not considered a replacement for vaccination, they are known to reduce hospitalization or death in people at higher risk of serious illness from Covid-19.