Towards the end of my article in this column last week (see Nigeria and the Coronavirus Vaccine Race, The Nation, 5 July 2020), one of the questions I raised about nigerian scientists’ contribution to the cure of coronavirus or a vaccine against it for the benefit of the federal government’s investment in it through a special budget distributed through the Central Bank of Nigeria.
I didn’t hear the presidential applicants’ organization about COVID-19, to which I asked questions. Fortunately, however, after being informed through a friend, I learned of the lifestyles of a privately funded indigenous company, Pax Herbal Clinic and Research Laboratories, founded by Father Anselm Adodo and Ewu-Esan, Edo state. The laboratory has been in operation for about 25 years and produces and distributes local herbs throughout the country.
With the advent of the new coronavirus, called COVID-19, the scientists in the laboratory devoted themselves to the paintings and arrived here with a mixture of 3 main herbs, the sour kola (orogbo in yoruba); ginger (ata-ile or ata’le in yoruba) and turmeric. Each of those herbs has been used since time immemorial around the world to treat an infection/disease or some other, or is simply used as a spice.
The herb mixture comprises ingredients, adding 6-paradol, gingerol, kolaflavanone, kolanone, curcumene and s-turmerone and remarkable nutrients and minerals, such as copper, zinc, calcium, iron and magnesium.
The set of phyto-medicinal components of the drug has strong anti-infecting, immunomodulatory and anti-inflammatory effects. The components synergistically inhibit autoimmune diseases by regulating inflammatory cytokines and inducing the immune formula to combat and overwhelm any invaders. It is in this sense that the herbal mixture acts as an oral vaccine against the new coronavirus.
The anti-inflammatory effects of the herbal drug are important, given the increased incidence of moving clots discovered in the latter stages of treatment in many patients who have contracted COVID-19. This plant-based drug is expected to prevent you from forming such clots in the first place. What is even more attractive about the drug is the absence of side effects. Of course, none are expected, as herbs have been used since time immemorial.
The herbal drug was packaged in 290 mg pills, encapsulated in gelatin shells. The capsule is characterized by an aggregate of green-yellow, has a bitter taste and a stinky smell. The recommended dose is two pills taken with a glass of water twice a day.
The use of the medicine is not limited to the remedy of patients with COVID-19 alone. It is also useful for remedying and controlling compromised immunity and symptoms caused by viral infections. In addition, it is a resistant antioxidant. During a pandemic, such as coVID-19, the effect of the entire “vaccine” of the drug lies in its continued use as prophylaxis.
The drug has already undergone preclinical trials and has been approved for human trials through the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control with NAFDAC REG. No. A7-4358L. It is this approval that some exaggerated enthusiasts and social media enthusiasts have misunderstood. However, neither Pax Herbals nor NAFDAC have presented the drug as a cure for COVID-19.
Meanwhile, those who participated in the initial human trials, adding patients with COVID-19, expressed satisfaction with the drug.
However, despite how promising this drug is, bureaucratic bureaucracy in human testing remains a major challenge, especially for cash-stracyl laboratories like Pax Herbals. Moreover, the bureaucracy is even thicker in terms of access to funds, which the Presidential Working Group has shown that the federal government has set aside to be administered through the Central Bank. However, the Central Bank’s online page does not imply any transparent trace to access the fund.
In a telephone verbal exchange with Father Adodo as recently as yesterday, August 11, 2020, he expressed frustration with the bureaucracies of human testing and investment in the country. To further complicate matters, the government has not yet provided mandatory protocols for human trials of herbal medicines. However, it would not be content with the adaptation of existing drug protocols.
However, Pax Herbals is not alone. Even the African Centre of Excellence for infectious diseases genomics (ACEGID), located at Redeemer University in Ede, Osun State, is already at a disadvantage in its collaboration with the University of Cambridge in the progression of a COVID-19 vaccine. In all likelihood, clinical trials of the vaccine will be based in Cambridge, rather than Ede, or due to the widespread deficiencies and deficiencies for which Nigeria is classified.
As Professor Oyewale Tomori, Nigeria’s leading virologist and infectious disease specialist, rightly noted, Nigeria does not have the laboratories for clinical trials and lacks the fundamental infrastructure (electricity, water and facilities good enough) to produce vaccines. He concluded with a poignant suggestion, if not an accusation: “The government will have to put all the infrastructure in position. It is not the duty of citizens or personal enterprises to do so.”
However, unlike ACEGID, Pax Herbals does not have a foreign partner. He doesn’t even want his product to be actually indigenous. However, the pitfalls highlighted above may explain why commendable efforts to expand local herbs, such as Pax Herbals, die in clinical trials.
Given the promise made through PaxHerbal Cugzin, it will be very unfortunate that Father Adodo’s efforts have not been nurtured well, despite NAFDAC’s encouragement that the drug is tested in humans.
It will be even more unfortunate for the drug to be sold to a foreign pharmaceutical company and re-marketed in Nigeria. The federal and state governments will then be willing to purchase it at an exorbitant value for use in public hospitals. Why invest in the effort now and make PaxHerbal Cugzin an original Nigerian product?