Preparing for the post-antibiotic era: A Critical edition of the Ao Shi Shang Han Jin Jing Lu

All of you who have been following my career over the last few years, probably already have a copy of my “Gold Mirrors and Tongue Reflections” in your collection. My original research started in 2004, as a direct response to the SARS epidemic of 2002-2003. The main idea was to look back through the history of Chinese medicine, and seek realistic solutions for a hypothetical post-antibiotic era, and learn from everything that has worked in historical attacks of pestilence.

Of course, it is understood that in today’s world, the advancements in medicine mean that there are many solutions for dealing with epidemics, through the development of antibiotics, antivirals and vaccines.

But if what we have learned from SARS is an indicator, every now and then there will be a new virus that will be just a little too strong, and will spread just a little too fast, and get out of control just a little before the WHO and the goverments can respond.

Just imagine a world where a virus needs to be aggressively treated with steroids, and its sequela will last for many years, affecting your ability to work, play and live a regular/normal life. That's exactly what happened with the SARS virus, just before China managed to contain it in the mid-2003.

Hopefully, this will never be the case again, but I believe it's more reassuring looking into the future with a plan B, through examining the clinical experiences of the past.

Back in 2004, as a Master’s Degree Research Candidate I attended Prof. Liang Rong’s classes on the Ao Shi Shang Han Jin Jing Lu and the Shang Han She Jian.

In 2014, she invited me to co-author a critical edition of the Ao Shi Shang Han Jin Jing Lu, as a blueprint for others to teach her class after her retirement.

If you have been to any of my lectures, you probably understand the immense importance of looking at the tongue when dealing with infectious disease and epidemics.

Anyway, back to today. This afternoon, Liang and I, went to the Library of the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences to access several rare tongue diagnosis manuscripts. Some of the books we handled were burned, others had stamps from the Japanese occupation or the Manchukuo State, others had pages torn out, ripped in half, and restored back together. I somewhat felt that I witnessed the entire recent history of China through a lens of its surviving rare manuscripts.

We were not allowed to take photos of any of the rare documents. But I took a photo with Prof. Liang for remembering todays explorations.

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