The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared, in 2003, that it does – in valid clinically controlled trials.  They have posted some of those scientific studies on their website as well as an 87 page report detailing their own findings on Acupuncture.

Click on the link below to see for yourself.   (2018 update – WHO changed their website and I can not yet find where they moved the report; but I’ll put the WHO link below anyway).

Here is an opening to one of the WHO report pages:

“Over its 2500 years of development, a wealth of experience has accumulated in the practice of acupuncture, attesting to the wide range of diseases and conditions that can be effectively treated with this approach. Unlike many other traditional methods of treatment, which tend to be specific to their national or cultural context, acupuncture has been used throughout the world, particularly since the 1970s”.

WHO website link.

Straight from the website are 27 diseases/disorders that WHO found scientific evidence which supported/”proved” that Acupuncture was good for (see below).  And on their site this list is followed by another list of 63 conditions which scientific studies have shown benefits for, but broader studies are needed before WHO will call those diseases/disorders ‘proven’ to be effectively treated by acupuncture:

1. Diseases, symptoms or conditions for which acupuncture has been proved-through controlled trials-to be an effective treatment:

Adverse reactions to radiotherapy and/or chemotherapy
Allergic rhinitis (including hay fever)
Biliary colic
Depression (including depressive neurosis and depression following stroke)
Dysentery, acute bacillary
Dysmenorrhoea, primary
Epigastralgia, acute (in peptic ulcer, acute and chronic gastritis, and gastrospasm)
Facial pain (including craniomandibular disorders)
Headache
Hypertension, essential
Hypotension, primary
Induction of labour
Knee pain
Leukopenia
Low back pain
Malposition of fetus, correction of
Morning sickness
Nausea and vomiting
Neck pain
Pain in dentistry (including dental pain and temporomandibular dysfunction)
Periarthritis of shoulder
Postoperative pain
Renal colic
Rheumatoid arthritis
Sciatica
Sprain
Stroke
Tennis elbow