Doctor divided over kiwi, papaya leaves juice as remedy for dengue

LUDHIANA: Dengue and chikungunya are posing a major threat to the lives of the city residents with more and more cases coming in with each passing day.
Besides treatment, diet plays an important role to bring you out from these viral fevers.
With the fever gripping the city, people are looking for alternate or natural remedies to treat and control the vector-borne disease.Once such common remedy, that is believed to help, is to use papaya leaf juice to help a patient suffering from dengue recover. While some say that this might just be just a myth, there are others who swear by the remedy.
While we talk to city-based doctors and residents about the myths of the viral infections.
Dayanand Medical College and Hospital (DMCH) principal Dr Sandeep Puri said, "Dengue and chikungunya are viral infections. For both, treatment given is supportive as these viral infections take time to get cured. There are many of myths attached to it. Dengue patients start eating kiwi fruit or juice of papaya leaf or take goat milk. These are all myths and by taking these one cannot just cure dengue or chikungunya."
Dr Candy Sodhi from Christian Medical College said, "The treatment for both infections are supportive. People believe that by taking all this stuff their illness will be cured. However, they have to take supportive treatment. Once the level of infection will go down, the platelet count will automatically go up. One thing which is good is that these fruits and milk strengthen immunity and keep the patient hydrated. But if a dengue patient is having a lot of kiwi, his throat can get sour and some problem can develop. In case of dengue there should not be any kind of internal bleeding."
According to Dr Sodhi, fruits and aloe vera are good for the health in case of these infections but they only aid in treatment. They can help in speedy recovery
Dr. Mamta Girish, a city-based ayurvedic doctor, said, "I suggest dengue patients to take kiwi, goat milk, papaya leaf juice and coconut water. These things help increasing platelet counts."
While Dr. Tejinder Singh, a homeopathic doctor from BRS Nagar, said, "No doubt patients are taking aloe vera, giloye or papaya juice so that the platelet count could increase, but I really don't believe in this as there is no scientific proof of the same till now."
However allopathic doctors don't believe in these myths as no evidence based study or trials have prove this but several ayurvedic doctors belive in these natural remedies.
Like doctors, many residents are also divided over the use of these home remedies to increase platelet counts in case of these vector-borne diseases.
Arsheen Chawla from BRS Nagar said, "My mother-in-law was detected with dengue two days ago and we were giving her lot of kiwi, aloe vera juice and juice of papaya leaves. It's what everybody said. However, today instead of number of platelet increasing, her health suddenly deteriorated and we had to take her to hospital in emergency. I believed in these natural remedies but these turned out to be just myths. These did not helped my mother-in-law at all."
Tanu Vohra, a resident of Sarabha Nagar, said, "My husband had dengue and I was giving him what people said. I followed things like papaya leaves juice and kiwi and these worked for us. I don't know if they are myth or not, but these things helped us."
Every hour a liquid among following choices like Daab, Goats milk, Leomanade
Juice pomegranate and masami fresh
coconut water. Adding she said I made sure to give Minimum 4 ltr a day liquid and
Now twice a day give papita leave juice with honey n blackpepper 1 tablespoon.
Kiwi 2 times and semi solid diet if possible.
She added, "I read somewhere and I followed the diet along with supportive treatment and it worked for us."
Baby Kaur from Model Town said, "My daughter had dengue last year and she was even admitted to a hospital. We were giving her fruits and what people said, but her health did not approve and she had to be taken to a doctor. I think whatever the doctor says that is the best for the patient."
The belief
Aloe vera juice after every meal is believed to increase platelet count
Beetroot juice mixed with carrot juice can boost immunity
Kiwi is seen as a wonder fruit for dengue with no scientific data supporting it. Poor patients are also shelling out money for this pricey fruit.
Tulsi leaves extract and grounded black pepper helps increase immunity in patients
Papaya leaves juice may help by reducing symptoms of fever like body ache, chills, feeling low, getting tired easily and nausea