Civil Rights History and the Birth of Western Community Acupuncture

What we now call “community acupuncture” originated with the Lincoln Acupuncture Detox Collective in New York City in the 1970. Community activists staged an occupation of Lincoln Hospital in the South Bronx. The activists had a list of demands for improving care at Lincoln. The conditions there were bad and getting worse by the day, and like so much else going wrong in the South Bronx, the city didn’t seem to care. The activists knew their community deserved more, and decided they could do a better job providing healthcare than an absentee government.

Lincoln Hospital had been suffering from decades of neglect. Locals called it “the butcher shop” because of a slew of unnecessary deaths and botched surgeries. When the city refused to acknowledge the heroin epidemic that was tearing the community apart, alongside cops selling dope from their patrol cars, the Black Panthers and the Young Lords stepped in. Their first attempts to maintain control of the hospital were beaten back by police, but they did not give up. Faced with the dedication of the activists, municipal authorities had no choice but to give up control.

In the wake of their success, the activists negotiated with the city for use of drug treatment funds and space to set up a detox program. Community ran and organized, Lincoln Detox and it’s “People’s Program” was officially founded.

The most common method for treating heroin addiction at the time was methadone. Lincoln detox used this therapy, but never fully embraced it. Methadone treatment was part of the “medical establishment” – white doctors in white coats whose condescension and disregard stung the hearts of the local Black and Latino communities. Methadone didn’t break the cycle of addiction; it simply replaced a one addiction with another where the drugs were doled out by the government.

So the Lincoln Detox leaders searched for a better way. At a community meeting, an activist named Mutulu Shakur read aloud an article describing the use of acupuncture to cure opium addiction by a doctor in Bangkok. The People’s Program was intrigued and after some searching hired two practitioners.

Once the acupuncture program got started, Doctors, staff, and patients quickly embraced it. Patients found that it decreased their cravings and gave them a much-needed sense of peaceful well-being. As Lincoln Detox grew, it became a magnet for acupuncturists and medical doctors to teach, learn and observe. Community leaders, like Shakur, who had an interest in healthcare became licensed acupuncturists and taught a generation of practitioners who spread the technique to cities all over the country.

Because the program was so popular, Lincoln Detox required a simple and quick treatment to keep up with long lines of patients. This led to experimentation with points in the ear, and the eventual creation of a five-point treatment, known as the National Acupuncture Detoxification Association protocol, or NADA. NADA is now one of the most widely used sets of acupuncture points in the country.

Even though the program was a success, in 1978 Lincoln Detox was evicted from the hospital and pushed into a small and poorly equipped building, where it continued at a reduced scale. Municipal authorities alleged corruption and misuse of funds, but activists say the Program was shut down in an effort to smear and undermine the Black Panthers and other community groups.

Although it lasted less than a decade, its mark can be found in almost every acupuncture center in the country. The Lincoln Detox is a testament to the power of community organization in healthcare. The use of acupuncture there was an early and influential adoption of this powerful treatment. Any acupuncturist who uses the NADA protocol or treats addiction and mental health owes a debt to the Black Panther Party and the dedicated activists who pushed back against a city’s indifference.

Activists occupied Lincoln Hospital, a public institution, until the city agreed to lend space to a drug addiction treatment center known as the People’s Program. Andrew Burton / Getty Images