Some years ago, at the end of a three week business trip across China, two days before I was to leave for home, I contracted amoebic dysentery – or something resembling it at least. Violently ill and rapidly worsening, my Chinese colleagues were urging me to allow them to take me to a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to be treated. Like most who are not familiar with TCM, I recoiled at the idea, preferring to trust my fate to the travel pack of pre-prescribed antibiotics I carried on such trips for just such emergencies.