Even as Gujarat’s capital Ahmedabad announced the closure of all shops except those selling milk and medicines for a week, the state government shared its “success story” with the Ayush Ministry and claimed that quarantined persons benefited from drinking an “Ayurvedic kadha” to keep Covid-19 at bay. A kadha is a “concoction of various Ayurvedic herbs and medicines to boost immunity”.

Jayanti Ravi, the principal secretary of health and family welfare department, Gujarat, said that ayurvedic medicines were administered to 3,585 people at a quarantine centre, while homoeopathic medicines were given to 2,625 people. “Only eleven of these people tested positive for Covid-19, and that too happened because they were unable to complete the prescribed dosage. This goes to show that this experiment to provide ayurvedic and homoeopathic treatment, or prophylactic immunity-boosting treatment to those in quarantine, has worked quite well,” she said.