Former
acting Vice Chancelloer of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Anthony
Elujoba, who is a professor of Pharmacognosis at the Pharmacy Department of the
university, says that the National Assembly should pass the Traditional
Medicine Council Bill to make its practice top-notch.
You recently
said Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Presidential Task Force on COVID 19
should allow herbal medicine to manage willing victims of the virus. Is there
an herbal cure for coronavirus now?
There is no cure for it yet as far as I know, but what we are talking
about is the management of their symptoms. COVID-19 has never occurred before
now, so, nobody can claim to have a cure for it. Herbal medicine could be used
to manage COVID-19 symptoms like sneezing, cough, fever, respiratory troubles,
diarrhoea and pains. There are herbs to treat these symptoms.
Is that not the same way they are using orthodox medicine to manage
COVID-19 patients?
That is what I suppose they are doing but
I am not part of the team, so I cannot say exactly. What I have read on some
platforms which are not evidence-based is what you have said. They are also
managing terrible symptoms like respiratory problems and giving the patient
analgesic drugs, expectorants for cough, and adding some immune-stimulating
drugs like vitamin C. I saw another one on social media talking about
giving them ARV, anti-retroviral drugs which are being used for HIV/AIDS. You
know that HIV is also a viral infection. That is the same principle herbal
medicine can also use. There are anti-retroviral medicinal plants in literature
and there are plants that can treat all of these symptoms as well.
Have these plants that can treat
these symptoms been compounded into herbal mixture, tablets, or capsules?
Yes
of course. The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control has
officially listed some medicinal plant drugs that can handle all of these
symptoms. They are well prepared and well packaged and people have been using
them since 1999 when the law establishing NAFDAC was made.
Are you saying these products have
NAFDAC approval?
They
have NAFDAC listing numbers. Listing means they are temporarily approved. I
think it is renewed every two years if there are no problems. If they are now
developed to the level of a clinical trial, NAFDAC can now be considering them
for total approval like any orthodox medicine.
What has been preventing them from
getting to the clinical trial stage?
Many
things are responsible for this, but I can only talk about research and
development of herbal medicine in the university. The major problem is finance.
I will give you this example. In the 1990s and early 2000 when I was in the
‘Village Chemist,’ I had so many products even for people living with HIV/AIDS
and all the symptoms we successfully treated in them were the same with
symptoms associated with COVID-19 now. The commonest symptom in them was fever
and each time you had a handshake with a person living with HIV, their palms
are warm. This means their body temperature is always high. After the
anti-retroviral drug, which could be given free of charge to people living with
HIV came and we soft-pedalled and we were no longer treating people with
HIV/AIDS. But when we were treating them, people got to know that the drugs
were also useful to those who did not have HIV/AIDS. Everybody in Africa
would have malaria and we started MSc and Ph.D. theses on all of these products
and the very first one we did was for malaria which was common to everybody. We
prepared the drugs, packaged them and we started selling them. We had three
anti-malarial products. I transferred the Village Chemist to the university and
the drugs have now been listed with NAFDAC. They became popular and people were
buying them, so, we patented them. After patenting, we collaborated with our
doctors at the Obafemi Awolowo University Teaching Hospital in Ife. They were also
eager to join hands with us to write a proposal for a clinical trial. That
proposal was accepted by the Ethical Research Board of the hospital for us to
go ahead with the clinical trial on human beings. Now we applied for TETFund
(Tertiary Education Trust Fund) grant for the clinical trial and of all the
projects I was told were considered by TETFund, ours was not there.
What reason was given for excluding it?
I
don’t know, but you can assist us to ask them. After that, we sought
collaboration and applied to the West African Health Organisation because I am
a consultant to them, Herbal Medicine Development for ECOWAS (Economic
Community of West African States) and I have been attending meetings to make
presentations on these drugs. After that, I was invited to submit a proposal
for a clinical trial for the anti alarum herbal medicine. Immediately we
realised that TETFund was not doing anything for us, we applied to the West
African Health Organisation. At the point of signing the approval letter for
the fund by the director-general of WAHO, this COVID-19 started and every fund
was directed to that. We are still praying and expecting that that letter of
approval before the DG will one day be signed when COVID-19 is gone. We are
only waiting for external funding because the government here is not helping
us.
Have you contacted the Federal Ministry
of Health if there is anything they can do about it?
By
their mandate, they don’t give fund, they can only support applications. It is
not their mandate to fund research. The government has given TETFund the
mandate to fund researchers.
But have you contacted the
National Assembly which carries out oversight functions on this establishment
to help push for the fund?
I
don’t agitate too much about things. I wait for God to do whatever he can do
about it. The WAHO invitation came miraculously, so, I believe God can do it. I
do go round to meet people, I am always in my laboratory working in my way to
make the country great by what I do. If the government calls me, I am ready,
they use me a lot and anytime they call me, I don’t object but I don’t go about
pressing buttons.
Have you made your suggestions
about the management of COVID-19 cases known to NCDC and the Presidential Task
Force?
I
have no access to NCDC or PTF. I am only used to some officials at the Federal
Ministry of Health because they have put me in some committees. I have made
some moves towards that. Until now, there was no response and I can understand
because herbal medicine is not yet at a stage that everybody accepts because of
the disadvantages of herbal preparations. There are advantages and there are
disadvantages. The knowledge of herbal medicine now is beyond the level it used
to be. We cannot run away from herbal medicine because of some disadvantages.
Many of them have been resolved scientifically, but many people don’t know.
Disadvantages like what?
There
are a number of them already raised like it is not scientific, unhinge nix
preparation, adverse effects which could come up and occultism. But science has
answers to these disadvantages if I explain them one after the other. Except
for occultism that is everywhere in Africa, it is in every trade and even in
journalism, so, nobody can say it is restricted to herbal medicine practice.
So, nobody can say they would shun herbal medicine because of occultism. We
should all be prayerful and I am saying this because of my experience.
When I became the acting vice-chancellor, I introduced the second stanza of our
anthem as the national prayer before all official meetings.
Are you also collaborating with
virologists to achieve your goal?
Virology
and other branches of science have a role to play in herbal medicine, including
anthropology. We can collaborate with anybody. If virology and pharmacognosy
had collaborated before, perhaps we will not be looking for an answer now. We
would have had the answers to these emerging diseases like the Ebola virus,
SARS and others. I used to know a virology laboratory in the University
College Hospital (Ibadan) and I sent an email to the head of that laboratory.
The email was never responded to, maybe the man never received it, but I didn’t
follow up. I am saying this now because we are eager to collaborate, we need
somebody who is a virologist, who is ready to work with herbal medicine to use
herbal medicine to see whether we can control these emerging diseases. That is
what I want the government to try and facilitate.
Since there is no known cure for
COVID-19 and you believe that there are herbal products that can manage the
cases, will you be willing to try the herbal drugs on infected monkeys to show
their efficacy?
That
question should be posed to knowledgeable virologists we have in the country
and there are many of them. If we want to do that, we require the collaboration
of virologists. There are many products apart from mine that have been listed
by NAFDAC.
Are you saying if there are
willing virologists, you are ready to test the products on monkeys?
That
should be possible. We had tried our malaria products on animals here before we
asked people to take them. If any virologist is ready to do that, we are ready.
The plants are there and we can supply the extracts.
Is it true that bitter kola can be
used to prevent coronavirus?
Although
bitter kola is known to possess some antiviral activities and I know it is
reported as a good anti-hepatitis, I am yet to find in the literature that it
has been successfully used to treat COVID-19 or Ebola virus in an
evidence-based clinical trial. When faced with the need, I used to include
bitter kola in my treatment of respiratory health issues in the Village
Chemist. In general, I do believe (within the limit of my literature up-date)
that bitter kola also carries the same chances as all other known antiviral
herbs in the books, to treat or prevent emerging diseases such as COVID-19,
Ebola virus or others if subjected to the test.
The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi,
has said that herbal cure would soon be found for coronavirus. Are you working
together on this?
No.
But fortunately, the Ooni is my father. Mine is to go to the laboratory and
make known what I found out there.
Do you think you need legislation
to push herbal medicine practice to a greater height in Nigeria?
The
WHO/Afro Office has done a lot. The office has given a lot to every developing
country in Africa to certify traditional medicine and to institutionalise traditional
medicine practice. Traditional medicine should be approved the same way
orthodox medicine is approved. Some countries had perfected this. The late Prof
Dora Akunyili came and implemented the law which we commended in 1999. I was a
member of the committee that proposed the law. When she came and said herbal
medicine could then be approved by NAFDAC, I was very happy. That was when
herbal medicine started gaining recognition in this country. The government
also supported the formulation of herbal pharmacopeia. It contains medicine
plants that have been approved not to be toxic, to be safe to use, and with
little properties scientifically proven in the form of a crop under each of
those medicinal plants. Any plant that appears in that pharmacopeia has become
an official drug in that country. The edition of that book, Herbal
Pharmacopeia, was inaugurated in 2008. Another committee has been inaugurated
to review that book. That is one of the recommendations of the WHO Afro office
towards ensuring total integration of traditional medicine. The most important
one remaining now is the bill at the National Assembly.
What is the bill all about?
That
is what we call Traditional Medicine Council Bill. It states that there must be
a council regulating the practice of traditional medicine in Nigeria, just like
we have Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria; Pharmacists Council of Nigeria;
Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria. That is the one that will guide and
regulate the practice of herbal medicine for people that want to open clinics
and traditional medicine hospitals. Already, NAFDAC is the institution
regulating the products, including herbal drugs, but NAFDAC does not have the
mandate to regulate the practice. NAFDAC is just to regulate that the products
are good, safe, and efficacious.
What stage is the bill now?
About
12 years ago, the bill reached the National Assembly and I think it passed
either the first or the second reading and it died. The bill has now been
reviewed by the Federal Ministry of Health and they have passed it through the
Ministry of Justice and I was told that the bill is now going to be re-sent to
the National Assembly. I am not sure if it had been sent or it is about to be
returned to the National Assembly. So, those are the two journeys that the bill
is making.
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Madagascar is claiming to have
found an herbal cure for COVID-19. Will herbal medicine practitioners in
Nigeria be willing to collaborate with your colleagues in that country?
We
do not have to collaborate with any country in Africa on anti-malaria plants,
every country has its own. The inducement for people looking for anti-malarial
plant stems from the fact that chloroquine has been mentioned even by the
United States President, Donald Trump. What we, herbal scientists, thought
immediately was using medicinal plants with anti-malarial properties because of
various advantages of herbal medicine. It is available with us, we don’t need
to import it. It is affordable and readily acceptable by our people. We are thinking
that if chloroquine does it because chloroquine is being considered to do it,
then we will use our medicinal plants to do it. We are sure that our people
will accept it than chloroquine. The first symptom of COVID-19 is fever and I
guess that is why Madagascar went straightaway to investigate their medicinal
plants with anti-malarial properties and they got it. If Nigeria had allowed us
to do it at the time we were agitating for it, we would have been the first.
What is now your recommendation
again on this?
I
will suggest that there should be parallel treatment centres across the country
where herbal preparations will be used. Only COVID-19 patients that opt for
herbal management should be admitted there. There should be informed consent
and the patients would be told in the form what the management is all about,
the medicinal plants that are inside and they should be told it may work and it
may not work. So, the patient will think about it and decide whether they want
it or they don’t want it. Those that want it will take responsibility for
whatever happens, then experts will be stationed at such centres because they
have to supervise it if they prepared the products. But nobody can say
they have herbal medicine that cures COVID-19 now because it is a new disease.
Is there any ailment that herbs
cannot manage or cure?
I
am aware that just a small proportion of known herbs had been investigated
pharmacologically. Many known diseases have not been subjected to phytomedical
investigation, for example, COVID-19. There are still many more plants yet
un-investigated and it is impossible to know whether such plants will cure
emerging diseases without any pharmacological experiments. Traditional medicine
practitioners believe that there is no disease whose cure cannot be found in
the forest. There is a spiritual faith-evidence that God has divinely provided
a cure for every ailment in the same environment where He has allowed the
corresponding ailment (Ez. 47:12; Rev. 22:2). Since there are thousands of
medicinal plants yet un-investigated for human or animal ailments, I believe
that it is surer and wiser to seek an herbal solution for a new disease like
COVID-19 by research than by synthetic investigation for chemical drugs.
I
strongly suspect that, among the Chinese-donated material consignments of
COVID-19 supports, their government would have included a lot of traditional
Chinese medicines whose compositions and safety we, or even NAFDAC, did know
little about. The Chinese herbal preparations will most probably not “cure” but
be immune-boosting and/or for COVID-19 symptoms. Can we not also use some of
the NAFDAC-listed immune boosters? We can also be innovators in Nigeria of what
the whole world will buy.
Apart from making herbal medicine
to cure malaria and manage other ailments, is there anyone for cancer that is
ravaging the world?
That is not my area, but I know a
colleague within the field of pharmacognosy who is doing that. I have never
worked on anti-cancer herbal medicine.
Do you have the one that can cure
sickle cell?
That
is where I started from and there is a product now that has been patented and
all that we used is pawpaw.
Does the product cure sickle cell?
It
doesn’t cure it but it manages it. It prevents crisis and it can reduce crisis
if it comes.
Has that one also been listed by
NAFDAC?
No.
It has not been listed by NAFDAC because the university has not provided all
that is required by NAFDAC. There must be a place where you prepare it in a
hygienic form with a good manufacturing practice. It must look like a
mini-industry. I guess the university is handicapped by the fund.
Can herbal products cure the
mental problem and bone issues?
There
are bone setters and for psychiatry, we call them traditional psychiatrists.
The two areas of herbal practice have been recognised by the World Health
Organisation a long time ago. The WHO recognises that they have enough skills
to be exploited by primary healthcare. Some of the renowned psychiatrists we
have like our former Vice-Chancellor, Prof Roger Makanjuola, have collaborated
with traditional psychiatrists before.
