JAIPUR: In a new twist to the controversy surrounding Baba Ramdev's claims of a coronavirus 'cure', Jaipur's National Institute of Medical Sciences which had collaborated on this has now distanced itself from the controversial ayurvedic drug and stated that no clinical trials of it were conducted at the hospital.
NIMS Chairman, Dr. B.S. Tomar said, "there was no clinical trial in our hospital of the drug. There was no serious case in the patients we admitted. Only 100 asymptomatic patients were given few Ayurvedic medicines under the sponsorship of Patanjali. But we did not prepare any medicine nor did we know its name."
He added that the permission from ICMR's Wing CTRI (Clinical Trials Registry - India) was solely taken this purpose.
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Dr. Tomar claims that he had the CTRI permission for five ayurvedic medicines to be tested on coronavirus patients. "We had not asked for medicine to cure coronavirus but only these ayurvdic immunity boosters. Whoever got these, recovered 35% faster. That is all," he said.
Tomar also said that he had informed Rajasthan Medical and Health Department through an email however, the state government sent a notice questioning the trials without the permission of the ethical committee.
Further clarifying, Tomar also stated that NIMS and Patanjali do not have any kind of financial contract between them.
Interestingly, in the press conference during the launch of Coronil, Tomar was seen sitting beside Baba Ramdev.
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Ramdev on the other hand, had claimed that a clinical case study of coronil was conducted on patients admitted at NIMS located in Chandwaji on the Delhi highway in Jaipur.
"In the clinical control trials conducted on over 100 patients, 67 per cent of the patients became negetive within 3 days and 100 per cent of them were cured within 7 days. The death rate of corona positive patients was nil.This drug has been prepared jointly by Patanjali Research Institute and National Institute of Medical Science (NIMS) University, Jaipur," Ramdev had said.
When Tomar was questioned as to why he did not stop Baba Ramdev from making tall claims at the press conference, he said, "Nobody can ever stop anyone from commenting but I never said that this is a cure for Corona. I only said that this is a medicine to boost immunity."
Currently, Rajasthan and Maharashtra have banned the promotion and sale of Patanjali's newly launched 'coronil'.