Some lion hearts of Nigeria's traditional medicine and alternative medicine are proudly and confidentially bringing out one formula after another from under the bushel and parading them in public…to persuade their country folks that Nigeria has local cures for Coronavirus (COVID-19).

Professor Maurice Iwu led the way a few weeks ago with a public statement that he has a vaccine cure. Professor Ayodele Adeleye emerged in the public last week with a similar claim. A former microbiology lecturer and medical researcher at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Kaduna State, Professor Adeleye said his formula was scientifically proven and he was ready to treat five Coronavirus patients free of cost. Also aboard the Corona virus cure train is Dr Ben Amodu, who owns a 30-bed African Alternative Medicine hospital in Abuja. He claimed this week that one of his patients had tested negative. Behind him are some herbal formulas which he said, had cured throat cancer, colon cancer, lung cancer, other lung diseases, would cure Coronavirus (COVID-19), and would also cure Toyota virus which, as he put it, may be on the way after Corona virus. One of the old horses of the industry, Mr Olajuwon Okubena, a chartered accountant who came into prominence in 1994 when The Guardian newspaper reported that his blood formula was a possible alternative to blood transfusion, dusted the dozen or so scientific investigations on his formula in Nigeria, Europe and in the United States, and positioned it as invaluable remedy for COVID-19. I write as a man-in-the house in respect of Mr Okubena's formula, Jobelyn. The treatise on it is too long to publish here. For this reason, I will advise the lay public as well as editors and all doctors and allied staff treating COVID-19 patients worldwide to read it up in www.olufemikusa.com. I was privileged to follow the research and development of this product since the 1990 and was present at its presentation in Accra, Ghana, conference in 2002 and then at another in Senegal in 2006. At both presentations, Jobelyn returned home with first prizes. Professor Iwu was present at the Senegal conference, and from there, undertook a work relationship with Mr Okubena which saw jobelyn undergo various laboratory investigations in the United States. Mr Okubena has subjected jobelyn to various laboratory tests for all sorts of situations. The long story began at the college of medicine, pharmacy department of the University of Lagos where jobelyn showed capacity to help the body produce a large quantum of blood hematocrit within 24 hours in extreme Anaemia conditions, including that of sickle cell anaemia. Then, it was found to cut excess blood sugar, decrease arthritis pain. At the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH) Jobelyn was adjunct medicine in a psychiatric care study. The University of Ibadan College of Medicine, and that at the University of Benin, were not left out. The military Hospital at Ikoyi, Lagos, found Jobelyn improved the well being of HIV patients and presented it's findings at a conference of world Military Hospitals in Bethesda, United States. A Tunid, Tunisia study was to report HIV cures. Other studies have suggested that, with ORAC much higher than in most well-praised Euro-American herbs and fruits, Jobelyn is a tough not antioxidant powerhouse. In COVID-19 disease, antioxidants are indispensable. So are anti Inflammatories because, in this condition, the lung system is extremely inflammed. In tests abroad for its anti inflammatory potentials, Jobelyn was found to outclass prized anti inflammatory chemical drugs of those nations riddled with many side effects. In respect of Corona virus COVID-19 infections, Mr Okubena is presenting Jobelyn as a Nigerian herbal blood product which has many roles to play in the fight against this pandemic disease. Corona virus creates inflammation… Jobelyn is anti inflammatory. Corona virus creates tissue damaging free radicals… Jobelyn is a powerful antioxidant. Corona virus strikes and thrives in depleted immune conditions… Jobelyn is a proven immune booster. Corona virus causes blood clotting and other blood problems… Jobelyn is a proven blood normaliser. Doctors say they have no cure as yet for Corona virus attacks, but that they manage the complications… Okubena says the complications are the same as Jobelyn has been found in laboratory and clinical experiments to satisfactorily address. So, why not adopt it as adjunct medicine in COVID-19 therapy as a Nigerian contribution to world medicine? Why Jobelyn may not have obtained the acknowledgement of the Nigerian government which it deserves may be due to nothing but the Nigerian factor and the politics and business of medicine. While the business of medicine lines up the purses of those who decide what foreign medicines Nigerian hospitals must stock and prescribe, the politics of medicine ensures that local formulas which will not fatten those purses are kept out of public view and veneration.

This much Dr Ben Amodu tried to say when he was asked to comment on why his medicines are not acknowledged by the health authorities of this country and of the offer by China to help Nigeria in the battle against the pandemic. But he did not antagonise China.They were nationalistic and right to sell their country's medicines to the world. Has president, did Donald Trump not jump the gun to prematurely bring up chloroquine which causes many health complications and even death. Has his country not finally accepted help from China?

In the weeks ahead, we should expect more people in traditional medicine and alternative medicine to emerge from obscurity and self effacement and shout themselves hoarse, some spuriously. President Muhammadu Buhari opened the gate wide for alternatives to pharmaceutical vaccines, which have not emerged, any way, because it would be irresponsible to watch people die needlessly when curative intervention agents may be available, untapped, in realms of medicine outside allopathic medicine. If traditional and alternative medicines remain held down by allopathic medicine in this trying period, there is something about them that can no longer be caged. That is the awareness of the public that natural formulas now are available which can help them prevent and cure terrible diseases. This awareness has been seen in Nigerians abroad who cured themselves of Coronavirus infections at home on self medicated herbal formulas which this column has reported in the past few weeks.

This season and the aftermath will be a tough time for allopathic doctors. They are currently like the lion wearing a crown and sitting on the throne of medicine.The lion will attempt to tear down and eat raw any Hunter of the crown and the throne. Already, allopathic (Western trained or orthodox) doctors have been saying claims of herbal cures for the pandemic are flukes. The blasting is set on two grounds. First, it is said that viral infections have no cures and run their full circles. That is absolutely correct. Second, they say viral infections can be self limiting. That means they may expire on their own without killing the patient. That, also, is absolutely true. They say self limiting viral infections may be what natural medicines are dealing with when they assume they are achieving cures. This, too, cannot be dismissed. But what many lay observers like me find difficult to understand is the reluctance to try some of these formulas that have certified clinical or laboratory records, especially if they may better treat those self limiting symptoms.

The umpires in this business are all friends of allopathic medicine and they all speak the same language. All medicines must be scientifically proven and definitive in their biological actions. Traditional medicine, on the other hand, being almost always folk lores of a people which have sustained their health over millenia, is content to be The Healing Art of a people, explicable or inexplicable, as the World Health Organisation (WHO) defines it. In the last century, the WHO got all member nations to recognise that more than 80 percent of the world's population depended on traditional medicine. On this basis, all nations agreed to upgrade, by 2010, their traditional medicine institutions to the standard of allopathic medicine. This meant there would be traditional medicine colleges of medicine, research centres, hospitals and a regulating council. Many countries have made substantial progress towards this goal. Nigeria is still crawling like a snail towards it. Mr Okubena started a clinic in Lagos and employed allopathic doctors who showed interest in traditional medicine. But, soon, he gave up. Dr Ben Amodu manages to still hang on with his. Reverend father Anslem Adodo has opened a traditional medicine hospital at the GRA, Ikeja, Lagos for his Pax Herbal Centre. But the road to parity with allopathic medicine is still far. It is possible Corona virus (COVID-19) pandemic will open the gates a little wider if traditional medicine and alternative medicine state their cases better.

Dr. Ben Amodu

On Youtube, I ran into the following interview last Monday of the Nigerian alternative medicine care giver who claimed he had cured a Corona Virus Covid-19 patient at his 30 bed hospital in Abuja. The interview goes….

' I am Dr. Benard Amodu, a Fellow of the Pharceutical Society of Nigeria, a Fellow of …. Alternative Medicines. I own the African Alternative Medicines Hospital, a 30-beded hospital here in Abuja. I am a lead phyto-medicine researcher. Immediately the pandemic broke out, the Minister of Science and Technology gave a statement that whosoever is a local researcher, that has knowledge in this area, should write them, and I was the first person to contact them. Two weeks, when my letter was not attended to by way of calling me, I approached them that I was the one who wrote this and I had done a research on the cure of cancer of the throat and that it was from there I got this vaccine because I was waiting to know what was the make of the infection of the new virus. I was told the throat. So, we got something that can eliminate cancer of the throat and thereby disorganise any disease of the throat including Corona and Anta which has first come out and also Toyota Virus that is yet to come out.

The interviewer asked Dr. Amodu what he thought of the plan of the government to import Coronavirus vaccine from China when, as he claimed, he had made one. Dr Amodu replied:

' I am coming from the background of herbal medicine, not just herbal medicine, even food medicine, no side effects. And I have always said my medicine will be the one to beat any where in the world. First, it has no side effects and it is very, very effective. Even then, don't talk about my new cure. You know people like anything which comes from abroad. I said the same thing when I discovered the cure for malaria about 15 years ago and I said at that time it was the vaccine for malaria and is also for curative and it was compared with Chloroquine and found equal or better than Chloroquine and Pyrimethamine. Today it still stands. And even with that alone, don't talk about my new prevention which is a vaccine. I already have a curative and a vaccine agent in the name of Saabmal which beats Chloroquine and now it can cure corona. It is listed in NAFDAC, it is in the market and is doing very well. It cures malaria within a few hours of use, malaria and typhoid. And now it can prevent and cure Corona. As a matter of fact, there is someone in Isolation who is positive and we are hoping he would do his test (last Tuesday). So far he is in very high spirit because he can see the effects of the medicine already. (Dr. Amodu told me on Tuesday that the man tested negative early that day from two test results. He gave me the man telephone number if I wished to speak with him).

The interviewer asked Dr Amodu if he could ' boldly ' tell Nigerians that he had given his vaccine to someone who tested positive to Conronavirus (COVID-19). He replied:

'Yes, that is the one ….in fact, they are supposed to be four. One of them is undergoing the test which is SAAVD-19. That is vaccine. These three have been given to the person… the SAAB which boosts human immune system beyond human imagination, the SAABFAT6 which takes care of lung diseases, cancer of the lungs, pneumonia and stops fibrosis of the lungs. The Saamal beats chloroquine in an international forum in Addis Ababa, was tested in a suppressive Test provilative test, creative test, it has 95percent effectiveness against f.persiferium which is a positive agent of malaria and is also an absolvent in the treatment of so many diseases. I have two vaccines undergoing all test. So far, I have been cleared in the test. Just waiting for the NAFDAC Note. Others have been registered by NSFDAC over 10 years and have already been approved. And then the immune booster which has won consistency African immune booster of the year three times because of its consistency as an immune booster in the market. Nigeria has a sustainability in all this virus fight, with the research I am doing and the research my colleagues are doing. The President's statement is very clear. He will use everything, including alternatives available in his country, to protect his people. And this is one of those alternatives that we have. We are ready to work with the government. I read in the Vanguard about three days ago that India says it was not ready to give it's Chloroquine to anybody. It was only after America begged that they said okay we can give you a little. And we have something better than Chloroquine. SAABMAL which has been listed more than 10 years ago is for malaria and typhoid and,by latest discovery now, is for the cure of Corona Virus . SAAFAT6 takes care and prevents cancer of the lungs,pneumonia and fibrosis finally the immune booster. So far, the three combo of my products are fantastic. I have two vaccines for Nigeria and have given government to test. So what am I suppose to do after? My research work is just the same as the ones Nigeria went to get in other countries. Nigeria went to China to get anthematacine for malaria for which state government spend N3.6billion clearing land. As we speaks,nobody has produce any capsule of anthematacin. We are not given anything here but we did a local research here to get number one product in the world because it has beaten chloroquine. And it does not have side effect like chloroquine on like chloroquine.

'Nigerians should know that we have what is better than what the world has. I always subject product to analysis, I appeared on NTA panorama and promised to produce malaria drugs that will be the best in the world and it has come to past. SAABMAl we send to America in line with the best practises in the world, then an American publisher expose our products details to the world and WHO sponsor us to UN to present it and presentation was for suppression of malaria, prevention of malaria and cure of malaria compare to the standard of chloroquine athametamin.

Did Doctor Amodu consider it wise for Nigeria to seek help from China? He did not see any thing wrong with it since China has acquired experience in fighting off the pandemic.

'When the president of Nigeria have spoken about alternative like this our herbal product,what type of inward are we still looking for? My hospital is African Alternative Medicine Hospital, we don't do operations, we use our alternative medicine to take care of illness like communicable and noncommunicable diseases. Now we have coronvirus, anta virus even Toyota virus, call them any name this product will take care of them. These are diseases that we have the product that can stand the test of term to cure them.

'Finally, before I stop, since we look up to America and the rest of the world, America came to my lab and collect my product for analysis in their lab in Texas, because they learnt my product takes care of cancer, because the colon cancer in US, the find that the drugs was reacting very well and they find out it is also good for lungs cancer the same test they got 89 per cent cure rate on the both cancer, is it not a rejoicing that Nigeria product can cure two cancer in the world. And with those people that talk with both side of their mouth I think with this, they should just keep quiet. In the world of medical health, Nigeria medicine will stand out, our products comes from plants and the chloroquine comes out from back of chinconal plant.

'Nigerians let get serous we are the biggest black nation in the world.

Finally, those who suffer sickel cell SS can't marry, we can revert SS to AS and one the medication started no more attack again ,their is reto conversion from SS to AS without operation, anybody that want to travel to India, China, for treatment we have the original treatment here without operation, the first of his kind in the world.

© Pakistan Press International, source Asianet-Pakistan