With no established cure found yet, the coronavirus pandemic continues its grim march across the world. The viral disease has now infected more than 17 million worldwide and killed nearly 670 thousand.
At a time when scientists everywhere are struggling and working hard to develop a vaccine for Covid-19, some of our kaliwals have been making false claims about having a cure for the disease. Have a look.
1. Sheen chai
During the initial days of the coronavirus pandemic, a rumored story went viral among the locals of Khyber Pakhrunkhwa which tells the story of a kid being born in a local hospital who came with a message.
According to the rumored story, a baby was born in a hospital in Peshawar (some verions say Swat or Charsadda), told the nurses that the cure of Coronavirus is tor chai (black tea) and died right after delivering the message.
2. Toori chai
Another version of the tor chai story said that the kid said it is shin chai (green tea) which cures Corona.
Ironically, a large number of people even fell for the rumored story and gulped down mugs of shin or tori chai, hoping it will do the magic and keep them safe from corona.
Well.. as you can tell, it didn’t work out and the story turned out to be fake. Local police identified the the guy who made up the story and took him into custody. The guy released an apology video after his release, telling people not to believe his story as he made it all up.
3. Hakim Alokozai’s ‘vaccine’
In June, a hakim from Kabul became a nationwide sensation in Afghanistan after he claimed to have discovered a cure for Coronavirus.
Hakim Alokozai, who has been working as sage for more than 25 years now, claimed that the drugs he discovered can treat Coronavirus patients within 30 minutes after taking only three drops of his liquid medicine.
Alokozai claimed to have given the cure to several Coronavirus patients and came up with positive results. According to him, around 300 coronavirus infected patients have recovered after using his ‘vaccine’.
After the news of his rumored ‘vaccine’ broke out, Afghanistan’s Ministry of Public Health tested his vaccine and the result showed it had been made from different narcotics. Acting Minister Ahmad Jawad Usmani in a press conference told media that the so-called vaccine of Alokozi was not effective in curing coronavirus and it could lead to addiction.
4. Steam inhalation
Another famous ‘cure’ for Corona from the WhatsApp university was inhaling steam. Gotta give it to Facebook and WhatsApp, rumors spread like wildfire there and so was the case here — this home-made remedy made it’s way from the western countries to Asian households and people on twitter could be seen complaining about it:
5. This baba from Swat claims Opium can cure Coronavirus
Uh this one is my favorite. This old fellow from Batagram Swat was confident that the Corona isn’t anything new but a typical cough that can be cured by using opium just once.
He further added that the only reason we can’t cure new-found illness is because they (the Englishmen) give it a new name so we get confused. We already know the cure for everything but we don’t know what it is that we are dealing with, that’s why we are left with no cure.
The elderlyman, named Lalay, also challenged everyone to bring him 100 corona patients to him, whom he will give him his ‘opium cure’ which will cure them in only 15 minutes or in 1 hour maximum.
See for yourself:
While most of the people are taking this pandemic as an opportunity to utilize their free time to do something productive, others are simply misguiding people.
Today, when Pakistan has crossed 297K cases, it is important that we do not fall for any home-made ‘remedies’ and follow the guidelines prescribed by the World Health Organization. Or, just wear masks properly (so it covers our nose and mouth and not just hangs there like a neklace).
Meanwhile, trials for Coronavirus vaccine are already undergoing in many countires as more than 170 teams of researchers are racing to develop a safe and effective vaccine. Here’s hoping that this all ends soon and things turn back to normal. Stay safe everyone!