DAMMAM — Doctors have voiced concerns about unlicensed healers and herbalists who sell herbal medicines in perfumeries and beauty salons. They warned that these medicines cause dangerous complications and chronic diseases including cancer, hepatitis and renal failure, reported Al-Hayat Arabic daily. They said the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, the Saudi Food and Drugs Authority and municipalities were to blame for allowing the proliferation of these medicines. They said the occasional awareness campaigns launched by the different media organizations did not help much in deterring people from using these treatments. They stressed the importance of launching intensive awareness campaigns targeting women to convince them not to seek the help of herbalists. Most of these herbalists are pharmacists, they claimed, adding that they diagnose diseases, prescribe medicines and dispense them to patients without knowing their side effects. Dr. Badr Al-Shitri, medical consultant, said herbalists or so-called traditional healers do ignore the possible side effects of herbal cures. This is why people who use such remedies develop serious complications that may lead to death, he said. Al-Shitri said these so-called doctors sometimes prepare medicines consisting of more than one herbal ingredient, a potentially toxic combination. Many of these treatments can cause liver and renal failure. He said pharmacist use precise measurements when prescribing medication, but herbalists use their fists to measure. This adds to the danger because most of these plants consist of toxic substances, he said, adding these herbalists are making money at the expense of the health of those they prescribe these remedies to. He said women are the most susceptible to these medicines because they are sold at hairdressing shops. Al-Shitri said one of his patients was a woman who suffered from liver fibrosis because of herbal medicine she bought from a beauty salon in Jeddah. The woman also suffered from pigmentation.
