Burkina Faso Establishes New Agency for Traditional Medicine

The government of Burkina Faso has approved the creation of a new national agency dedicated to traditional and alternative medicine, part of a broader restructuring of its public health institutions aimed at strengthening local healthcare capacity and medical self-reliance.

Announced following a recent Cabinet meeting, the newly established Agency for Traditional and Alternative Medicine is tasked with implementing national policies on traditional care and elevating what authorities describe as the country’s “national medical heritage.”

To streamline oversight and operations, the government formed the agency by merging two existing bodies: the Directorate of Traditional and Alternative Medicine and the Center for Traditional Medicine and Integrated Care. Under its new mandate, the merged institution will operate as a non-hospital public health establishment.

The move reflects a deliberate shift in how Ouagadougou approaches public health infrastructure. Government officials noted that achieving true health sovereignty requires looking beyond imported medical products and foreign-built facilities, emphasizing instead the need to invest in and develop local, endogenous resources. Traditional medicine already plays a vital role across the West African nation, where an estimated 80 percent of the population relies on traditional practices for primary care.

Alongside the traditional medicine agency, the Cabinet signed off on two additional public health institutions during the same session:

* Faso Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Faso CDC): A new national body dedicated to disease surveillance, outbreak prevention, and public health response.

* Permanent Secretariat for Infectious Diseases: A specialized body created to coordinate national efforts against HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), viral hepatitis, and tuberculosis.

Together, the three initiatives signal an effort by Burkinabè authorities to consolidate disease prevention and integrate indigenous medical knowledge more formally into the state’s healthcare framework.

For a closer look at these institutional changes, watch the coverage in Health: Faso CDC and traditional medicine, new structures planned, which highlights the government’s announcement of the new public health bodies.