Is it true that many people in India are being treated for COVID-19 using cow dung and urine?

In 2020 and 2021, major global media reported on a very unusual method of treating coronavirus, popular among Indians. We have verified the accuracy of such messages.

During the active phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the world media appeared messages that in India people are trying to prevent disease by using cow dung and urine. It was argued that these are not isolated cases and that the country allegedly even conducts parties, whose visitors collectively drink animal urine.

India, where live almost 1.4 billion people and where many residents are below the poverty line, turned out to be one of the countries most affected by the coronavirus. According to Johns Hopkins University, the pandemic took lives more than half a million Indians. A particularly difficult period occurred in April and May 2021, when the delta variant of coronavirus appeared in the country. At the peak of India's second wave, the number of daily infections exceeded 400,000, and was dying more than 4,000 people per day - and these are only official figures. In hospitals wasn't enough medical staff, beds, equipment and medicines, ambulances bringing the sick stood in giant queues for hours, and relatives of those infected tried independently find and bring oxygen to hospitals.

In such conditions, a significant part of Indians turned to traditional methods of treatment and prevention of infectious diseases, which are still very common in India. Much of this practice involves the use of a variety of products that can be obtained from cows without killing them. Doctrines of Hinduism, which in India profess More than 80% of the population considers the cow to be an untouchable animal; it is called the “universal mother” and is associated with the mother of all gods, goddess Aditi. Cows are not eaten, but everything that can be obtained from them during their lifetime is counts super valuable, including feces.

For example, drinking cow urine to get rid of cancer recommends Indian Ministry of Traditional Practices. The official Indian Cow Commission, set up under the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, has released a document in which statedthat the use of milk, urine and manure effectively heals psoriasis, eczema and other skin diseases, arthritis, leprosy, and at the same time helps relieve inflammatory conditions. In June 2021 in the country passed the first online exam for medical students on “advancing science related to cow-derived products.”

Among other things, cow's milk, urine and manure were and are used to treat and prevent colds. When the covid pandemic began, they began to be used by analogy to combat coronavirus. This practice has caused anxiety experts, since raw cow's milk and especially excrement often contain a large number of pathogens that cause severe and sometimes fatal diseases in humans. Diseases that can be acquired through contact with or consumption of drugs created on the basis of products obtained from live cows include: include, for example, ringworm, rickettsiosis (a disease caused by rickettsia bacteria and manifested, among other things, by inflammation of the inner lining of the heart), leptospirosis (a bacterial disease with a mortality rate of 5–10%, and in the case of lung damage - up to 70%), campylobacteriosis (also caused by bacteria, manifested by diarrhea), salmonellosis, listeriosis (a very serious disease, with development nervous form is almost 100% fatal) and much more.

Some experts believe that happened outbreak in India in 2020–2021 "black mold" - a disease caused by microscopic fungi of the Mucoraceae family and affecting the eyes, nose, lungs, skin and brain - may also have been partly related to the practice of treating cow excrement. Mucormycosis, as this disease is also called, developed in patients several weeks after their Covid symptoms disappeared. According to reports, this disease carried away the lives of almost 9,000 people who have suffered coronavirus infection.

Mucoraceae spores are also found in cow dung, and smearing with excrement or burning dung cakes to cleanse premises (another common practice in India) could contribute massive spread of fungi. However, the risk of infection is greatest for those whose immunity is weakened for any reason - for example, due to diabetes or treatment with steroids. Covid turned out to be an additional risk factor for such people, further reducing protection. In addition, it is in these people that the coronavirus often develops into a severe form, requiring the use of steroids.

However, the practice of using cow dung and urine was widespread during the acute phase of the pandemic, especially in some states. For example, in Gujarat worked a special Covid hospital where cow excrement was the only treatment. And one of the political activists, who after the death of the head of the Indian BJP party wrote on his Facebook: “Getting rid of the crown is not cow dung and urine. Deliverance is science and common sense,” even arrested. True, they were released fairly quickly.

Cover photo: Wikimedia Commons

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