EDITORIAL: COSTECH, Muhimbili alliance welcome
As the month of October this year drew to a close, the Tanzania Commission for Science and Technology (Costech) made headlines twice.
One: Costech will co-host the Annual Africa Science Granting Councils (SGC) meetings in Dar es Salaam from November 11 to 15 this year. According to Costech acting director general Amos Nungu, the Commission will do the hosting in collaboration with South Africa’s National Research Foundation (NRF) and the African Technological Policy Studies (ATPS).
This is a multi-disciplinary network of researchers, private sector players, policymakers and civil society actors promoting the generation, dissemination, use and mastery of Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) for African development, environmental sustainability – “and global inclusion!”
Two: Costech announced plans to link researchers into herbal/traditional/alternative medicine with industries in efforts “to ensure that the medicines the industries produce are safe for human use.”
To that very noble end, the Commission has “connected the Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (Muhas) with foreign researchers who are helping in the identification and production of traditional medicines.”
Not only that...
According to Dr Joseph Otieno – the Muhas director for Traditional Herbal Medicines Research – Costech is also funding major research projects by Muhas, “including a project for producing HIV medicine, in which we are in the initial stages.”
This isn’t as farfetched as would have been the case years ago when HIV/Aids was ravaging certain segments of the global community.
Analysts tell us that HIV research has come a long way since the malady was stumbled upon in the 1980s. Antiretroviral therapy was a major milestone that has changed the lives of millions; but the goal now is to find an HIV cure before 2020.
As reported in The Citizen on October 28, 2019, Muhas is indeed making steady progress in working on “herbal medicines that are projected to cure (yes: CURE!) pressure, diabetes, prostate cancer, malaria and fungal infections...”
Data collection
Going by the data already collected, Muhas are in the processes of producing 15 herbal medicines – “two of which are ready, and have been endorsed by the relevant authorities. The others are still at different research stages.”
Costech was created as a parastatal in 1986, and is tasked with the function of “coordinating and promoting research and technology development activities in Tanzania.
It indeed is “chief advisor to the government on matters pertaining to science and technology – and their application to the socio-economic development of the country.”
For its part, Muhas is Tanzania’s accredited premier institution in providing healthcare training, research and consultancy services – with the Institute of Traditional Medicine as one of its pillars in researching into “valuable botanical-pharmaceutical information on cures for many of the world’s diseases.” This is at a time when Tanzania is increasingly finding it necessary to ‘go traditional’ in the area of herbal and other alternative medicine. It’s also when the ‘Western World’s Big Pharma’ needs to be cut down to size for gloatingly claiming the monopoly on healthcare products.
