Traditional Chinese medicine takes effect on poor village

Poverty-alleviation officials check the conditions of gualou - an herb from the gourd species used in traditional Chinese medicine to treat coughs and constipation - in Zhongyuan village, Dongqiao township, Xiangdong district, Pingxiang city, East China's Jiangxi province, Nov 8, 2019. [Photo/Xinhua]

To treat a patient, a doctor has to look, listen, question and feel the pulse -- four diagnostic methods of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) -- before making prescriptions.

Wu Jun, 40, believes the traditional Chinese wisdom can not only cure patients but also poverty.

"Only through a thorough examination can we find out the root of poverty and eradicate it accordingly," he said.

Wu is an associate professor from the Jiangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine in eastern China's Jiangxi Province. Two years ago, he was appointed as a poverty-alleviation Party official in Zhongyuan Village at the mountainous border of Jiangxi and Hunan provinces.

As China has targeted eradicating absolute poverty in 2020 without a single person to be left behind, grassroots cadres and people are racking their brains to lift the remaining small number of impoverished people out of poverty.

By the end of last year, there were still over 5.5 million people living under the poverty line across the country.

Zhongyuan Village, home to 443 households, has barren soil and few industries. "A woman who married a Zhongyuan man would regret it forever on the remote barren mountain," as an old saying goes.