The journey of acupuncture and moxibustion (zhenjiu)Footnote1
1 In China zhenjiu translates as acupuncture and moxibustion. In the West it is the single word acupuncture that is commonly referred to.
in the UK as part of Chinese Medicine is entangled with UK politics, the structure of the National Health Service, the concerns of what is science and research, the changing state of higher education and the role of China as friend or foe within geopolitics. It is also entangled with individuals and relationships and situations. In this research note, I will trace the history of acupuncture education in the UK through the second half of the twentieth century to the present-day drawing on my 45 years of experience as an acupuncture student, practitioner and educator. I include a vignette based on my insider knowledge of one course, the first Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) school of acupuncture in the UK, its move into a university and its closure in 2023. While acupuncture includes systems that have developed in countries such as Japan and Korea the focus of this paper will be on Chinese acupuncture due to its major influence on course content in the UK.
