How complementary medicines won a court case in South Africa

Natural and complementary medicine is a highly contested space globally. Even the WHO wants to be involved and set up a Traditional, Complementary and Integrative Medicine department.

In South Africa, the
Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) upheld the judgement of the Gauteng North High Court, which struck down the controversial 2017 Complementary Medicine regulations under the Medicines Act.

Both the High Court and SCA unanimously agreed that the South African Health Products Authority (SAHPRA) has no legal jurisdiction to regulate substances that are not medicines or scheduled substances.

The verdict follows after the Alliance of Natural Health Products South Africa (ANHP), took the Minister of Health and the SAHPRA to court over contested regulations that would regulate all natural health products, defined as complementary medicines and health supplements, as medicines.

Watch TSN's Shabnam Palesa Mohamed unpack the case and the implications with lawyer Danmari Deguid and indigenous medicine advocate Menzi Maseko