COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) – The Sri Lankan health minister, who faced criticism for consuming and endorsing a sorcerer’s herbal syrup, tested positive for COVID-19.
A Health Ministry official confirmed on Saturday that Pavithra Wanniarachchi had become the highest-ranking official to be infected with the virus. She and her immediate contacts were asked to be quarantined.
Doctors said there was no scientific basis for syrup as a remedy for coronavirus. It is said to contain honey and nutmeg.
Thousands of people gathered in long lines in December in the city of Kegalle, northeast of the capital Colombo, to obtain the syrup, just days after Wanniarachchi and several other government officials consumed it publicly.
The syrup maker said he obtained the formula through his divine powers. In the local media, he claimed that the Hindu goddess Kaali appeared to him in a dream and gave the recipe to save humanity from the coronavirus.
Sri Lankans are accustomed to taking regular remedies and alternative indigenous remedies to cure diseases.
Meanwhile, on Saturday, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa announced that Sri Lanka will receive India’s first stock of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine on 27 January.
He said that India is giving this stock for free and that his government is taking steps to buy more vaccines from India, China and Russia.
On Friday, Sri Lanka approved the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine amid doctors’ warnings that frontline healthcare professionals should be inoculated quickly to prevent the collapse of the medical system. The vaccine was the first to be approved for emergency use in Sri Lanka.
The Ministry of Health reports that vaccination will start in mid-February.
Sri Lanka witnessed a new outbreak of the disease in October, when two groups – one centered in a clothing factory and the other in the main fish market – emerged in Colombo and its suburbs.
Sri Lanka reported 52,964 cases with 278 deaths.
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This story was corrected to show that the city where people lined up for syrup was Kegalle.
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