Union minister of state for AYUSH Shripad Y Naik on Thursday said that the AYUSH Ministry and the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) will begin clinical trials of four Ayurvedic formulations on COVID-19 patients within a week.
The CSIR, which is one of the largest autonomous research and development organization in the country, has partnered with the AYUSH (Ayurvedic, Yoga, Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy ) Ministry and have been working on formulating four Ayurvedic medicines to treat coronavirus patients.
“The @moayush & the @CSIR_IND are working together on validating four Ayush formulations against #COVID19Pandemic and the trials will start within one week. These formulations will be tried as an add-on therapy and standard care for COVID-19 patients,” Naik tweeted.
“I am sure and quite hopeful that our traditional medicinal system will show the way to overcome this pandemic,” he added.
Reports quoted AYUSH secretary Vaidya Rajesh Kotecha as saying that the four formulations which will be used as a potential treatment for coronavirus include Ashwagandha, Yashtimadhu (Mulethi), Guduchi +Pippali (Giloy) and AYUSH-64.
Although there has been no standard treatment for COVID-19, various kinds of clinical trials are being carried out to treat coronavirus patients.
There have been reports of plasma therapy being able to some coronavirus patients.
Meanwhile, World Health Organization’s (WHO) is also conducting a clinical trial on four treatment protocols -remdesivir, a combination of lopinavir and ritonavir, hydroxychloroquine and lopinavir and ritonavir with Interferon-beta-1a.- to find an effective treatment for COVID-19.