COVID-19: Using home-grown solutions to curb the disease

The Ghanaian times has been forced to return to the COVID-19 discussion because of the voracious manner in which it is killing people not only in Ghana, but also across the world.

At least more than 300 people have lost their lives to the disease that is spreading very fast, with hospitals being overwhelmed with patients 

As a matter of fact, the world appears to be at its wits’ end as it continues its desperate search for cure for the deadly disease. What is available now is a vaccine to prevent the disease from infecting people who take the jab.

But the vaccines are not readily available to all countries around the world. It’s only available to few countries, leaving the vast majority to fight the disease with safety protocols which have not yielded the desired results yet.

With the death toll rising and the disease spreading in a sinister way, many are now living in fear and scared that it might get close to the them because the number of infections keeps climbing day in day out.

In the face of these trying times, scientists and health experts continue to come up with simple home remedies and drugs that can be administered without necessarily visiting a health facility.

One such remedy recommended by the former Provost of the College of Health Sciences of the University of Ghana, Rev. Emeritus Professor Andrews Seth Ayettey, to health authorities to adopt to augment treatment for COVID-19 is hydrogen peroxide.

According to him, months of research led by him and other medical scientists into the chemical has established that just one per cent of hydrogen peroxide, when gargled in the mouth or dropped into one’s nose for a minute, could deactivate the SARS-CoV-2 strain that causes COVID-19 and break transmission.

The colourless liquid, which is often used for wide range of cleaning purposes, personal care and other consumer and industrial uses such as water treatment, has been highly recommended by the scientists to support the treatment of the disease.

Although, the scientists did not provide us with scientific data to prove the efficacy of the liquid, the Professor is quoted as saying that the chemical is effective to protect against contracting the disease as well as inactivate viruses shed by COVID-19 patients and their contacts, through sneezing, coughing or talking.

“Also, a one per cent nebulised hydrogen peroxide that would reach all parts of the respiratory tract, including the lungs, could prove helpful in management of patients with early signs and symptoms of COVID-19 and it would also protect contacts of these patients especially, health workers from being infected,” he stated.

Prof. Ayettey, however, advised that while the chemical’s efficacy was not in doubt, it should not replace other preventive COVID-19 protocols and treatment guidelines already in place, but rather complement them for optimum care.

We commend Prof. Ayettey and others like him for conducting research into the disease to find solutions that would save all of us.

We have no doubt that the use of hydrogen peroxide to fight off the virus in the country, alongside the public health safety protocols, would go a long way to save many lives.