What Does "Wind Pathogen Causing Disease" Mean?
In traditional Chinese medicine, causes of disease fall into three categories: external factors, internal factors, and non-external/internal factors.
External factors refer to pathogenic influences from the external environment (nature), equivalent to modern knowledge of parasites, bacteria, viruses, chlamydia, mycoplasma, etc. These substances exist in nature and invade the body externally to cause disease. These external pathogenic factors are called "external evils" (pathogenic factors in TCM are collectively termed "evil").
Internal factors refer to pathogenic influences originating within the body, such as adverse emotions, improper diet, excessive fatigue or idleness, etc. These internal-generated pathogenic factors are called "internal evils."
Non-external/internal factors mainly include sexual excess, falls and injuries, trauma, burns, scalds, frostbite, animal bites, etc.—causes of disease clearly identifiable.
Additionally, some secondary pathogenic factors arise after illness onset, such as phlegm and blood stasis, which become new pathogenic factors damaging the body and causing disease.
Let’s first examine diseases caused by external factors (also called "external infection diseases").
The cause of external infections is external evil. TCM divides external evils into six types: wind, cold, summer heat, dampness, dryness, and heat (fire), known as the "Six Evils."
Nature has normal climatic phenomena: wind, cold, summer heat, dampness, dryness, fire (heat), called "Six Qi" in ancient times. "Six Evils" refers to abnormal changes in Six Qi. Ancient people believed abnormal climate changes could cause disease (modern science confirms that bacteria and viruses reproduce and become pathogenic differently under varying climates). TCM borrows the names and characteristics of "wind, cold, summer heat, dampness, dryness, heat (fire)" to summarize all external factors disrupting the body.
First, let’s examine the characteristics of wind pathogen causing disease. How can we determine if a patient has been affected by wind pathogen?
Since wind is the dominant element of spring, natural wind has characteristics of sudden onset, upward movement, dispersion, unpredictability, and causing objects to shake. TCM attributes such symptoms to wind. Wind pathogen has four characteristics:
· Floating and superficial: Wind has the tendency to rise and spread outward, making it a yang evil. Diseases caused by wind manifest as surface-level, upper-body conditions prone to dispersion. Thus, symptoms like headache, nasal congestion, sore throat, cough, aversion to wind, fever, and sweating in common colds are attributed to wind pathogen. Early-stage colds can be treated with "Ginger and Jujube Decoction" (one piece of fresh ginger, five jujubes, boiled in water, warm to drink); alternatively, 10 grams of perilla leaf, or 10 grams of schizonepeta, 6 grams of platycodon, and 3 grams of licorice, boiled in water, warm to drink. Ingredients like ginger, perilla leaf, and schizonepeta all have wind-dispersing effects. These formulas are highly effective for early cold symptoms such as aversion to wind, nasal congestion, sore throat, and mild cough.
· Moving and changeable: "Moving" means wind pathogen’s symptoms shift location unpredictably—such as migratory joint pain or rheumatoid arthritis with pain shifting locations. "Changeable" means the manifestations vary widely—like hives with itching that appears and disappears intermittently. TCM commonly uses snake meat like white-flowered snake or black snake to treat such joint and skin conditions due to their strong wind-dispelling properties.
· Agitating: Wind has the property of agitation, so any involuntary shaking—such as sudden fainting, dizziness, tremors, convulsions, opisthotonus, facial muscle spasms—falls under wind pathogen. Conditions like cerebral hemorrhage or cerebral thrombosis caused by hypertension, presenting sudden onset, loss of consciousness, facial droop, etc.—characteristics of "shaking"—are called "stroke" (zhongfeng). Treatment requires wind-dispelling herbs.
· Often combines with other evils: Wind pathogen rarely acts alone but usually combines with other external evils—such as wind and cold, wind and dampness, wind and heat, wind and dryness—forming composite pathogenic factors with dual characteristics. Since wind is the primary cause of external infections, it is said: "Wind is the leader of all diseases," sometimes even representing external evils.
Any condition meeting the above characteristics is due to wind pathogen. Correspondingly, Chinese medicine has specific herbs for dispersing wind, expelling wind, and calming wind.