25 years of ESCOP--a story of success.

The coincidence of the 25th anniversary of the European cientific Cooperative on Phytotherapy (ESCOP) with the 25th nniversary of the Schweizerische Medizinische Gesellschaft für hytotherapie (SMGP) underlines the important movements in hytotherapy in the late 1980s. Although the triumphal success of synthetic drugs in the mid of he 20th century had led to a significant loss of traditional knowldge and an almost complete lack of regulatory frameworks for edicinal products of herbal origin, the rapid development of the Green Movement” in Europe starting in the 1970s resulted in a ignificantly increasing demand for herbal medicines in the public. onsequently, this fact caused the necessity of a harmonized legal ramework for such products as well. This was the moment for a few visionary people from Germany, he Netherlands, Belgium, France, Switzerland and the United ingdom to agree upon the constitution of a European umbrella rganisation of societies in the field of phytotherapy and herbal edicine. ESCOP was founded on June 18th, 1989 in Cologne and started to ourish within the following years. To fulfil the aims (i) to advance he scientific status of herbal medicinal products and (ii) to assist ith the harmonisation of their regulatory status at the European evel, a Scientific Committee was established to produce refernce monographs on the therapeutic use of herbal medicines. In ctober 1990 the first five monographs presenting a consensus f viewpoints from European countries were finalized. Later on, hose on anthraquinone-containing herbal drugs provided the basis or respective official documents of the “Committee on Proprietary edicinal Products” (CPMP). Within the 1990s ESCOP could expand the number of member ocieties to approximately 14 and the elaboration of monographs as successfully continued. The co-ordination of the leading U BIOMED research programme in the area of phytotherapy Determining European standards for the safe and effective use of hytomedicines” from 1994 until 1996 was the most important chievement of ESCOP in the early years and covered several subrojects. Among those it indispensably supported the monograph roduction which resulted in 60 monographs published in six conecutive volumes until 1999. During its first decade ESCOP organized five international ymposia in Brussels (1990), Milan (1992), the Hague (1994), ologne (1996) and London (1998) to promote the acceptance of erbal medicinal products, to initiate research and to extend the nternational accumulation of scientific and practical knowledge in phytotherapy. These were followed by two further symposia in Bonn (2001) and on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of ESCOP in Cologne (2009). ESCOP’s indefatiguable lobbying for “scientific phytotherapy” under the long-term presidency of Prof. Dr. Dr. H.C. Mult. Fritz H. Kemper also contributed to many achievements in the legal framework for herbal medicinal products. Significant changes for these products were included in the Directives 2001/83/EC and especially 2004/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council, among others with the establishment of a Committee for Herbal Medicinal Products (HMPC) and a simplified registration procedure for traditionally used herbal medicinal products (HMPs). Due to the fast-growing body of literature in medicinal plant research it soon became obvious that ESCOP monographs had to be updated on a regular basis. Thus, in 2003 the second, completely revised and expanded edition of 80 ESCOP monographs was published in book format. Until mid of the first decade of the new millennium ESCOP was the only editor of monographs in the field of phytotherapy providing updates. The completely voluntary work of more than 50 delegates and more than 30 external experts as well as the surpassing final editing of every monograph by Mr. Peter Bradley culminated in the Supplement to the Second Edition with 27 new and 8 revised monographs in 2009, in the year of the 20th anniversary of ESCOP. The changing environment for HMPs, the constantly increasing knowledge in the field of phytotherapy as well as the developments in publishing brought new challenges for ESCOP. To answer this and to assure rapid publication, ESCOP since 2011 publishes new monographs and revisions electronically as single documents in pdf format immediately after elaboration at the ESCOP webpage (www.escop.com) where the documents in the well-established format can be obtained very fast and conveniently. The tradition of international scientific symposia has also been changed in the recent years: In order to further promote the acceptance of phytotherapy with special emphasis on general medical practice, ESCOP supports national initiatives, e.g. by co-organisation of two joint congresses of the three member associations in Austria, Germany and Switzerland on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Austrian Association of Phytotherapy (ÖGPhyt) in Vienna (2012) and the 25th anniversary of the Swiss SMGP in Winterthur (2014). In the collaboration in the 1st and 3rd Ibero-American Congress of Phytotherapy in Mexico (2006) and Brazil (2012) networking with the Latin American umbrella organisation was started.