Expert cautions against using salt as Ebola treatment

Chat212 - Mail News... Report

►An epidemiologist with the Kwara State ministry of health, Dr Michael Oguntoye, on Friday cautioned against the use of salt for the treatment of the Ebola Virus Disease.
►Oguntoye also advised Nigerians to beware of GSM text messages asking them to bath and drink salt solution as a preventive medicine against the dreaded virus.

The expert on Public Health told Chat212 in Ilorin that he had received such messages and calls from people asking for the authenticity of the claim.

He said the claim had not been medically proven that bathing with salt and drinking salt solution could cure or protect one from the Ebola virus.

He said, “Ebola disease is contracted through close contact with blood, saliva, sweat, semen or secretions from organs of infected individuals and animals.

“People are only advised to disinfect their surroundings with one cup of Jik in nine cups of water solution in all their surrounding daily.”

According to the epidemiologist, there is no evidence to show that drinking salt can kill the virus.

Oguntoye also warned people against using Jik solution to bath, adding that the solution is only to disinfect the surroundings against the virus.

The expert reiterated that the virus is deadly with high mortality rate and no known cure.

NAN reports that the outbreak of the Ebola virus had sickened 1,711 people and killed 932, according to World Health Organisation.