MEDIUM RARE

And the race is on! Which of the 23 anti-COVID-19 vaccines being developed in China and the First World will be first to cross the finish line?

We may not be able to afford the prices of those early vaccines, but we have some homegrown remedies that doctors and pharmacologists are taking a second hard look at, for their antiviral properties. Desperate times call for desperate measures and treasures, such as a weed with a laughable name, “tawa-tawa,” and an oil with a virginal name, VCO, for virgin coconut oil. Lagundi is part of the trio of traditional cures that our researchers are putting under a big commercial microscope, but I don’t have enough empirical knowledge, other than lagundi’s usefulness as a tea, to share with readers. At any rate, no part of this essay is meant to be an endorsement.

VCO, the prime advocacy of Dr. Mark Dayrit, former health secretary, has been studied for its beneficial effects for the longest time. Having come under the scrutiny of scientists and FDA for  the last 30 years or so, it has gained a wide following among those who consume it by the tablespoonfuls daily like a vitamin, as a makeup remover, pre-shampoo conditioner, even as a laxative. Among the VCO faithful is a 50-year-old who swears it’s the best medicine he ever tried for gout.

Tawa-tawa (Euphorbia hirta L.) comes in the form of capsules in dark and light green for city dwellers who have no time to pick the weeds growing wild and free in the probinsiya. Labeled by FDA as “traditionally used to relieve symptoms of asthma,” tawa-tawa is a familiar name to people who grew up in the country and recognize its “folkloric” usefulness as a remedy for malaria and dengue also. After the leaves are boiled in water, the concoction is drunk like tea, or medicine.

Dr. Fabian Dayrit of the National Academy of Science and Technology is more than upbeat about VCO after 20 inmate patients of the Cebu City jail who had drunk the oil recovered from a mild strain of coronavirus. In addition, employees of the jail developed immunity. All this in April and May, when the city was a COVID-19 hotspot.