As Covishield and Covaxin have been cleared by India’s drugs regulator for sale in the market, an Assam firm is all set to launch their herbal medicine to treat the SARS-COV2 virus.
The herbal drug has been certified by the Bio Inoculation Centre of the Indian Institute of Life Science, an autonomous institute of the Central government’s Department of Biotechnology at Bhubaneshwar, as 98% effective against coronavirus.
The anti-viral herbal drink is a creation of Pankaj Gogoi from Dhemaji and Pranjal Gam from Golaghat in Assam.
“We now need suggestion from the AYUSH ministry or institutions like the ICMR on what further needs to be done so that the medicine can be taken to the people as herbal treatment for COVID. Communications with the AYUSH ministry is on, meanwhile, we are investing our best effort to establish safety and effectiveness of the medicine that has no side effect,” said Gogoi, who works with the National Livelihood Mission of Assam.
The anti-herbal medicine has gone through the mandatory EC50 test, which is done to ascertain the drink’s cytotoxicity (the quality of being toxic to cells) level and the report dated October 6 said it was highly effective on infected cells.
The duo has obtained the provisional patent for their concoction from the Kolkata office with articles been published in the patent journal.
“It’s our interest and inquisitiveness on herbal medicine and cure that led us to the interiors of Arunachal Pradesh in search of medicinal plants, leaves, stems, roots and fruits. We strongly believe that Mother Nature has an answer to all aliments. In 2019, when the pandemic broke out in China, we started our work on it. We thought that the available herbal treatment against viral disease like pox and measles could be effective, so we travelled across the length and breadth of the state and collected the anti-viral herbs. In Arunachal Pradesh, an NGO, Arunachal Vikash Parishad, helped us a lot in gathering the herbs from the hilly terrain. We gave our medicine to our friends who were COVID-infected and were willing to try. It worked effectively,” said Gogoi.
In between their busy schedule right from collecting the herbs from dense jungles to washing them and extracting the required ingredients by boiling them over wood fire the duo had communicated with the ministries and departments concerned for the essential permission for trial.
While the Prime Minister’s Office had on December 28 advised them to seek further guidance from the Institute of Life Sciences, the Ministry of AYUSH is yet to response.
The Department of Biotechnology had suggested them to approach the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council for “guidance in terms of pre-clinical testing, Drugs Controller General of India approvals, marketing approvals, etc”.
“It has been observed that for Omicron variant, it takes at least seven days to get cured, however with our medicine one gets relieved in four days. In the case of patients with co-morbidity, it’s very effective and has no side effects. The nagging cough that we see in case of Omicron gets better in two days. At this moment, we can treat 10,000 people and if need be, we are prepared for more demands as nature is bountiful,” expressed Gogoi.
The duo have also written to the National Centre for Complementary and Integrative Health at the US National Institute of Health for using their herbal drink against COVID-19. “We want our Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma to help us in this. The medicine is not for Assam or India, it’s for the world,” he added.
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