Project Report of Integrative Medicine (IM) and COVID-19 Care

Till March 2023, over 758 million people worldwide have been infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. While conventional medicine has interventions to prevent and manage symptoms associated with COVID-19 including vaccines, antibodies and antiviral medications, many patients still experienced poor outcomes. For those who survive, many suffer from the long-term ramifications of COVID-19 infection termed post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 (PASC), or long COVID. Using complementary and alternative approaches delivered by Integrative Medicine (IM) such as nutrition, dietary supplementation, herbal medicine, acupuncture/acupressure, exercise, and stress resilience therapy may offer alternative, or additive, or complementary benefit alongside conventional interventions for preventing or managing COVID-19 symptoms and PASC. This project report summarizes efforts from a first-of-its-kind, three-part project proposed and led by the US and supported by three co-sponsoring APEC economies (Chinese Taipei, Indonesia and Thailand) focused on IM for COVID-19 care: 1) A survey focused on science-based IM for COVID-19 care, 2) A Workshop to host various APEC economies to share and discuss efforts around the adoption and implementation of IM approaches for COVID-19 care, and 3) The development of Recommendations and Guidelines of IM for COVID-19 care.