The Coronil tablet and Swasari Vati medicine touted by Patanjali as being a cure for coronavirus have been facing adverse coverage since their launch as a kit amid great fanfare on Tuesday.
On Tuesday evening, the Union ministry of AYUSH, which oversees ayurveda and other alternative forms of medicine, ordered Patanjali to stop advertising claims of the purported coronavirus medicines. The AYUSH ministry stated that the facts of the claim of Coronil being a cure for coronavirus and the scientific study conducted on it were not known to it.
On Wednesday, news agencies reported that Patanjali's licence application for Coronil did not mention coronavirus.
Zee News quoted Dr. Y.S. Rawat, joint director, State Medicinal Licensing Authority of Uttarakhand, as saying, “Divya Pharmacy [owned by Patanjali] did not apply for licence of any kind of medicine related to Corona nor were they given any licence in this regard. The licence was issued only for immunity booster kits and fever medicine.”
“But now, that it has come to the attention of the AYUSH department, a notice will be issued to Divya Pharmacy. It their reply is not satisfactory, then their current licences will be cancelled," Rawat told Zee News.
Speaking at the launch of Coronil as part of the coronavirus kit, Patanjali founder Baba Ramdev was quoted by Livemint as saying, "This is not an immunity booster but a cure," said Ramdev, according to Livemint. "Sixty-nine per cent of the people recovered within 3 days. One hundred per cent of the people recovered in 7 days. There has been zero per cent death rate and 100 per cent recovery rate."
Ramdev said the research was undertaken by a joint team of the Patanjali Research Institute (PRI) and the National Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS), Jaipur, and that a clinical study and a clinical controlled trial has been conducted.