Charms are often recited by the healer and jealously guarded. Healers are found in all cultures. They are referred to as curanderos, brauchers, wart rubbers, goiter strokers, comadronas, granny women, and midwives. The last three usually attend women during pregnancy and childbirth. In Europe and in the United States the midwife has become increasingly professional.
Faith healers make use of prayer and touch to treat disease.
There are also magical rituals, or procedures, such as pulling a person through the cleft of a tree or a bramble bush to be divested of disease. Then there is putting a bag containing a mixture of worms and human hair under a threshold to cause disease. The person who steps over the hidden bag will get ill because folk healers can cause disease as well as cure it. China, Facts about Similarities Folk medical practices throughout the world appear to be structurally similar. Various ethnic groups coming from the Mediterranean basin have retained some of the beliefs of ancient Greek healers.