A homeopathic medicine has been found to be very effective against HIV/AIDS during screening at National AIDS Research Institute, according to Dr N K Ganguly, director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research.
"The homeopathy compound screened in vitro at NARI against HIV has been found to have a lot of potential in effectively killing the virus," Dr Ganguly told UNI.
However, he refused to name the compound as there were Intellectual Property Rights issues involved. Moreover, there was a memorandum of understanding with the company which had given the compound, which is already being used in treatment of some other disease, for testing against HIV so the details could not be divulged, he said.
He said the compound could be released for commercial exploitation only after it is tested on human beings. However, since there was not much toxicology involved in the homeopathy medicine, given by the Indian company for testing, it would not take much time.
Dr Ganguly asserted that it was a very significant development considering the fact that thousands of compounds are tested in NARI and sometimes none of them were found to be effective.
"We are adopting a lengthy process so that only an effective drug is launched," he said and added that the time taken in the entire process may be four to five years.
About the developments in the field of AIDS vaccine research, the ICMR director general said that clinical trial of the vaccine undergoing in Chennai have been proved to show some hope.
However, the one on which clinical trials were undertaken at NARI, Pune, earlier has been dropped as it was not found to be suitable enough. Dr Ganguly, who is also in charge of the new department in the health ministry devoted to research, said homeopathy compounds have been found to be effective in tackling a number of diseases like morning sickness, lower backache, psoriasis, rhinitis and chronic diseases of skin.
He emphasised the need for more clinical trial of homeopathic medicines to generate data to make it a globally accepted science and people accept them on the basis of informed choice. He also called for more research in homeopathy for scientific validation of treatments and generation of data and capacity building in the field of homeopathy.
