A total of 5,700 proprietary Chinese medicines that were manufactured or sold locally on or before March 1999 have secured a transitional registration with the Chinese Medicine Council of Hong Kong.
Another 1,800 proprietary Chinese medicines that were released into the market after that date have been given a 'non-transitional registration' status by the council.
Proprietary medicine is any product in which the active ingredient is a Chinese herb, formulated in a finished dose form for the prevention or treatment of diseases or the maintenance of body functions.
The council said it had assessed all 16,200 applications received since the registration system was implemented in December 2003 to ensure product safety and quality.
Gloria Tam, a member of the Chinese medicines board of the Chinese Medicine Council of Hong Kong, said yesterday that it was believed the 16,200 applications covered the majority of proprietary Chinese medicines in Hong Kong.
'The stricter requirement for the non-transitional scheme is inevitable, as late-comers should be bound by a higher standard,' she said.
