About
The Urban Fringe Pharmacy
is about herbal medicine in the context of urban transition culture. It has been set up by Bristol-based Herbalist, Max Drake, with the aim of providing a shared knowledge base and use of local resources, including wild and cultivated herbs for medicines.
We do walks, talks, workshops, and run courses all connected to herbs and how to use them. These are designed for a whole range of individuals and interest groups, from absolute beginners to practising herbalists.
We are also engaged in cultivating medicinal herbs and mapping the local area for herbs that can be foraged sustainably for professional and domestic use. At the risk of stating the obvious, we believe that an essential part of learning herbal medicine is about getting to know the herbs. This includes what they look like, how they grow, and generally having a direct perceptual experience of them in their prime, whilst they are still in the soil. This is a factor that is largely missing from contemporary herbal medicine courses. Also, in the spirit of transition awareness, it makes sense to grow medicinal plants locally, to build up community resilience in the face of near future changes in legislation and availability of resources (such as the resources that are required for the manufacture and distribution of pharmaceutical medicines). It makes equal sense to spread the knowledge and skills required to use native and local plants and medicinal preparations, empowering folk to take responsibility for their health and the health of the community.
Changes in legislation affecting the supply of herbs
When the Traditional Herbal Medicines Products Directive is finally implemented in 2011, most medicinal herbs and herbal preparations will disappear from retailer’s shelves. The only products that retailers will be allowed to sell will be those that have been granted a product licence by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulation Agency (MHRA). Each product, made by each manufacturer, will have to satisfy a wide range of safety and efficacy standards, and will have to be manufactured according to pharmaceutical Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) before it will be granted a licence. Manufacturers estimate that the cost for each licence will be a minimum of £25,000, and more realistically, £50,000. There have been 4 licences granted so far.
Furthermore, a Department of Health report issued in 2008 recommends state regulation of the practice of herbal medicine. The recommendations, if implemented, will allow registered herbalists to carry on using all the herbs that they can currently use, and dispense them to their patients, without licences. The main stipulation being that before you sell someone a herbal medicine, you must be able to demonstrate that you have conducted a consultation with the buyer. Herbalists will also be allowed to manufacture their own medicines without using a GMP certified production facility. However, and this is the crunch bit, if a herbalist chooses to buy in herbs or herb preparations from a supplier, than that supplier must have GMP certification. At present there are only two suppliers in the UK who have the certification, and it is unlikely that the rest will be able to afford to make the necessary changes to their production plants to get certified – so they are most likely to cease trading or be closed down before long.
Thus there is a near future scenario where there are only 2 suppliers left in the market supplying the whole of the UK. This seriously limits the choice of what is available, and given the cost of GMP certification (@£500,000 all in), the net result will be a large increase in price. So there are very sound financial reasons for herbalists to source and produce their own herbal preparations.
Sustainability goals of the Urban Fringe Pharmacy Project
Aside from the legislative and financial issues, it is also interesting to note that the majority of medicinal herbs on sale in this country (greater than 90%), are grown abroad. One of the main aims of the Urban Fringe Pharmacy project is to develop an indigenous pharmacopoeia, where herbs are entirely sourced from the UK, with the majority coming from the local area. With this aim in mind we would encourage herbalists to explore and regain the knowledge of our forebears about the uses of the many indigenous herbs that have gone out of fashion, largely as a result of the profits that can be made from importing more exotic sounding herbs.
Who are we?
Max Drake MNIMH
Medical Herbalist
Max Drake is a herbalist and teacher with a busy practice in North Bristol. Prior to training as a herbalist , Max spent 10 years manufacturing and marketing herbal medicines. His own clinical dispensary is made up mostly of medicines that he has made from herbs grown in the UK. For details of his practice see www.maxdrake.co.uk.
Jude English
Environmentalist
Currently studying full time for a PhD. Jude has been instrumental in setting up environmental projects in the West Country, either through the volunteer programme, CSV Environment, or professionally with several different local and national agencies.
Hello Max, found my way to you via the Mad About Herbs blog from Blotanical.
I enjoyed your reviews of the recent Grow your Own Drugs series. I missed it, but my fourteen year old son absolutely loved the series and related it all to me with great enthusiasm ( especially the calendula cream for acne which he told his older brother all about).
As a homeopath working in SW London, I sympathise with your perspective and share your frustration about the media’s ignorance/arrogance/impotence in the face of conventional medicine hegemony. They’re all frightened of being sued, and of course are regularly harassed by the angry mob which swarms over any positive coverage of alternative medicine. Despite the apparent breadth of knowledge available through the internet, it is getting harder for lay people to identify trustworthy and independent information. I chair a group in the Epsom & Leatherhead area, we have monthly speakers drawn from local qualified practitioners and there is great hunger for knowledge and understanding about health.
Your courses sound fantastic and I wish you every success in your vital work, educating people around Bristol and the south West about local sustainable herbalism.