Nixon and Scheel in China: Acupuncture and Anesthesia in West and East Germany in the 1970s and 1980s

Background

Acupuncture anesthesia was used instead of intubation anesthesia in the 1970s and 1980s in West Germany and West Berlin. In East Germany acupuncture played no decisive role.

Sources

Different articles and papers in journals, in daily press, statements of contemporary witnesses, films, records in archives.

Results

As in other Western countries, acupuncture was hugely popular in the Federal Republic of Germany in the 1970s. Chief triggers were the state visits to China of the American President Richard Nixon in 1972 and shortly thereafter of West German Foreign Minister Walter Scheel and his wife Mildred, an x-ray technician. During that period observation of an operation under acupuncture anesthesia was an obligatory element in the agenda of a foreign delegation.

Following this showcasing, acupuncture was widely adopted in Western surgery as an alternative to the previously exclusive employment of intubation anesthesia. While the alternative method was soon abandoned in the frontline city of West Berlin, it continued to prevail in other West German cities, e.g. Gießen and Munich. Following the Chinese example, the acupuncture effect was normally enhanced electrically.

In accordance with the animosity between the USSR and the People’s Republic of China, exchange between the German Democratic Republic and China was very restricted through the late 1980s. This made it easier for East German acupuncture sceptics to reject the procedure and brand it as unscientific. Those who advocated it were in a precarious position.

Conclusions

Acupuncture was lauded in the West as ancient savvy destined to complement science-oriented medicine. However, the cultural transfer which accompanied the spread of acupuncture was flawed by misunderstanding and misguidance.

Acupuncture anesthesia instead of intubation was not practiced in the GDR. Acceptance of acupuncture in East German medicine failed to make any headway until the last few years of the country’s existence.