‘Virus-free’ Turkmenistan champions herbal defenseAFP, ASHGABATAyna Garayeva, a teacher in the capital of authoritarian and secretive Turkmenistan, began taking extra sanitary measures in her classroom when the government issued new COVID-19 guidelines in August. Two Turkmen women fumigate a house with the smoke of burning wild rue in Ashgabat on Tuesday last week. In March, he ordered wild rue burning on a “systematic level,” trumpeting its bacteria and infection-killing qualities. Since the diktat, the cost of a wild rue bundle has grown fivefold to 5 manats (US$1.43). Herbal remedies have been widely used during the COVID-19 pandemic in countries with struggling public health systems, like Yemen and Sierra Leone.

Source: The North Africa Journal December 19, 2020 16:07 UTC