At present there is a felt need to recuperate cultural and social values, the common roots and the diversity among the European and Asian populations and to build cultural bridges for a better communication, participation, understanding, and sustainable development. The search for common Euro-Asian traditions and customs is particularly important for Sicilian population in order to be able to draw the fine line connecting the island to her neighbours and to benefit from added values in a shared manner. Optimising the past to understand better the present is one way to recuperate latent values and make them useful at present. Because of its geographical position in the middle of the Mediterranean, Sicily deepens its roots into most of the Countries around “Our Sea”. In the middle of the Mediterranean, Sicily became the crossway and the stopping point of most ancient known civilizations. Conquered by all, each population left, as a heritage, children, artwork, customs, legends, cooking styles, languages. Sicily and its people are a true blend of most Mediterranean civilizations. It is not by chance that this project on Traditional Medicine across Euro-Asian nations was developed: it responds to our need to discover, to share, to understand, to value and to further develop the profound links with our origins. However, this is not the only reason why this is an important project.

Another reason deals with the fact that traditional medicine is embedded into the culture of most European and Asian populations but it runs the risk of being lost due to modernization, as often it is only orally transmitted. Popular remedies have been traditionally used since the most ancient times and beliefs and practices related to illness and health are a central feature of culture in all human societies. Often illness and health are linked to a wider range of misfortunes (including accidents, interpersonal conflicts, natural disaster, crop failure, theft or loss), of which the pair illness/health is one form. In some of these societies, all these misfortunes are blamed on supernatural forces, or on divine retribution, or on the malevolence of a “witch”, of a “sorcerer”, or even of an “enemy” or envious person. In order to understand how people react to illness or other misfortune, including death, there must be an understanding of the type of culture that they have grown up with, their perception and interpretation of their world. It is also necessary to study the social organization of health and illness in that society, including the ways in which people have become recognized as “ill”, and the way their illness is dealt with. Depending on the perception of the nature of each episode of “illness” the choice of “therapy” by the sufferer and/or the family can be different. It is known that some would look for religious “therapies”, others for herbal, or for some other form of pharmacopoeia solutions. Some may opt for natural remedies, others for magical solutions. Some of the empirical “therapies” used to treat “illnesses” include certain home remedies, which are perceived as “effective” by the population, some of which have been proved effective by scientific research.

Another important issue related to Traditional Medicine is its accessibility, even to the most vulnerable populations. This is in terms of geographic, cultural and economic accessibility, while modern medicine often is not. One issue of concern to some of the European social and health systems is the explosion of various forms of traditional healing that seem to meet an increasing favour on the part of the population even in Europe. Magazines are full of ads for traditional healing services, able to resolve just about any problem in life in one place. Little is known about the efficacy of the proposed remedies and, even less, about their negative consequences, except for some projections of economic nature. Often undeclared as income or sale, the market value of traditional healing in Europe, including all forms of remedies, appears to be exorbitant and still on the increase without control. There is a need of more knowledge and understanding and perhaps standardization and regulation of those forms of “healing” which are known to be of proved effectiveness. This is particularly true in terms of doses as most natural remedies, for example, are empirically “prescribed” and liberally used. Interestingly, the issue of cost/effectiveness of some traditional remedies, if indeed these were proved to be effective, could be of interest to health systems in developing and in developed world. They could defray more expensive culturally imported therapies which are not always available, not always handled correctly (and therefore negative consequences can derive also from pharmaceuticals) and, perhaps, not always necessary.

Last but not least, with the increasing mobility of population, many coming from Asian countries, it is important to know their culture in order to be able to better understand and better help them. Also we could learn from them new important issues that could help us all to live healthier. An example for the rest of Europe, though this is not traditional medicine, is the famous Mediterranean Diet that makes people live longer and healthier. As well, modern medicine needs to understand better the intrinsic elements of culture and life in order to be able to better help people in need. The Mediterranean and Asian area is a “universe” of diversified and yet similar populations, all sharing culture, traditions and problems. However, success in their future, which is ours too, will lie in the common search for sustainable solutions. Culture can help to bridge eventual gaps.

The ethnographic information derived from this project will be shared and used, through the Web-Site, by the various European and Asian populations, by scientists and by anyone wishing to know more about the culture, the popular traditions and the heritage of great civilizations that have guided, at some point in time, the development of historical and scientific landmarks. The information will also be shared through a thematic virtual platform, workshops, seminars and publications.

In each partner country, target groups are the population, the healers, and the PHC Doctors. The direct beneficiaries will be approximately 50 Primary Health Care practitioners, 50 healers and about 200 people, two third of whom will be women. The indirect beneficiaries are countless and include the population in general, but also policy decision makers, sector specialists, doctors, researchers, trainers, tourists, foreign workers and World Wide Web users.

Target groups have been selected because they directly or indirectly have the information we need to carry out our studies, as they experience the positive, as well as, perhaps the negative effects of traditional medicine, as users, or, as carers. As well, they have information on costs related to each episode of illness/health treated with both traditional and modern medicine. Additionally, the results of these studies will be made available to them who may find them useful in their daily lives, as carers or as users.

Thanks to the project, target groups will have an opportunity to reflect, understand and confront experiences within the same country or with those in neighbouring countries. European and Asian people share history, culture, and environment. Some share also language and religion, while others do not. The study will allow the discovery of possible common roots across nations for what concerns the choice of traditional medicine, interpretation of illness episodes, perceptions of treatment effectiveness, of side effects, and of costs. The information will be re-elaborated and systematised, and good practices will be advertised through the web.

The ethno-anthropological study on the roots of popular medicine and of its present every day use by European and Asian populations, fits effectively with the program's objectives.
The cultural heritage of the people of this Region will be revived and its values shared among all, thanks to the creation of a common Thematic Network represented by: an innovative cooperation between European and Asian organisations in a new field of research, an electronic database about cultural information and records.
Particularly, the study will reveal the origins of traditions and common beliefs and of the remedies adopted, and will make them available, in a renewed and enriched way, to worldwide populations, to policy makers, to experts through the web, but also through other dissemination activities. The web-available database will contain descriptive, informative, guiding and educational information, which will be easily accessible to everyone connecting to Internet and to a thematic portal. Special care will be taken for the language used in order to make it comprehensible not only to specialists.

This project fits perfectly within the programme’s priorities in many aspects since it:

- promotes the richness and diversity of the cultural heritage of the European and Asian populations and its appreciation, by means of diffusing knowledge and information through interpretation and communication;

- awakes the awareness of a large number of people regarding the knowledge of this heritage as a means of cultural identity, an instrument of dialogue and a witness of the common cultural roots among the Euro-Asian populations;

- develops new information and communication systems through effective and advanced information technologies;

- diffuses methodologies and results within the participating institutions of the EU-Asian Region; it fosters the exchange of experiences, creates regional networks among scientific institutions for common and sustainable growth in the EU-Asian Region;

- collects and systematizes cultural heritage data and information and harmonizes it at Regional level in terms of methodologies, techniques and programs for a more effective management and utilization of cultural data.