RAMDEV’S FIRM UNDER GOVT SCANNER FOR COVID-19 DRUG
Ayush Ministry directs Patanjali to stop advertising ayurvedic medicine
NEW DELHI: Yoga guru Baba Ramdev's Patanjali Ayurved has come under the scanner of Ayush Ministry for its claim of discovering an ayurvedic medicine to ‘cure' deadly Coronavirus that has claimed the
lives of over 14,000 in India and over 4.40 lakh have got infected with the virus.
After Baba Ramdev's firm
launched the Coronil and Swasari medicine as a cure for Covid-19, the Ayush Ministry directed the ayurvedic firm to stop advertising the product until the “issue is examined” and asked to provide at the earliest the composition and other details of the medicine it claimed is for the treatment of the virus.
However, the ministry said that facts of the claim and details of the stated scientific study are not known to it. As per the ministry, Patanjali has also been asked for details of the sample size, sites and hospitals where the research study was conducted and the Institutional Ethics Committee clearance.
The concerned Ayurvedic drug manufacturing company has been informed that such advertisements of drugs including Ayurvedic medicines are regulated under the provisions of
Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954 and Rules thereunder and the directives issued by the Central government in the wake of Covid outbreak, the ministry said in its statement. Notably, the Ayush Ministry, in its letter dated June 2 to all states, had stated that writing Covid or Covid-19 related claims and name of the ministry is a violation of the norms and in cases the errant firms fail to comply in one week over the warning, the FIR may be filed against the firm.
The Ayush Ministry's letter had clearly stated that activities like false claims and publicising about approval of research study or product manufacturing about Covid-19 is a breach of the legal provisions. Meanwhile, Baba Ramdev's firm has claimed that the two Ayurved-based medicines have shown 100 per cent favourable results during clinical trials on Covid-19 infected patients except those on a life support system.
The medicines have been developed by Patanjali Research Center, Haridwar and privately-owned National Institute of Medical Science, Jaipur following all protocols with clinically controlled trialbased evidence, Ramdev told a news agency.