A VIRAL post on WhatsApp retrieved on August 16 claims that drinking warm water ‘will resolve’ many health conditions, including epilepsy and high blood pressure.
The claim read thus: “a group of Japanese doctors confirmed that warm water is 100 percent effective in resolving some health problems such as epilepsy, high blood pressure, migraine, pains of joint, asthma and others.”
According to the claim, epilepsy and paralysis could be resolved in nine months, while diabetes and high blood pressure could be resolved in 30 days with two glasses of warm water daily.
“Get up early in the morning and drink approximately 2 glasses of warm water when the stomach is empty. You may not be able to make 2 glasses at the beginning, but slowly you will. Do not eat anything for 45mins after taking the water,” the message on the pamphlet shared on WhatsApp reads.
The pamphlet also claimed that drinking cold water is “bad for you”. ‘If cold water does not affect you at a young age. It will harm you at old age.
It further claims that cold water closes four veins of the heart and causes the attack.
Cold drinks are the main cause of heart attack. It also creates problems in the liver. It makes fat stuck with the liver. Most people waiting for liver transplant are victims of cold water drinking.
Cold water affects the internal walls of the stomach. It affects the large intestine and results in cancer.
The claim on the pamphlet was said to be from Dr. D. Mensah-Asare.
FINDINGS
Dr. Richard FRU, a Cameroon-based naturopathic doctor and researcher also posted the claim on Facebook on the 9th of July, 2017.
Also, a Facebook user Yuppy’s Inspector shared it on the 25th of January 2017 generating 85 comments and 110 shares.
The ICIR also found that the message attributed to a group of Japanese Doctors’ or ‘Dr. D. Mensah Asare is shared on Pinterest, Twitter, Nairaland and Reddit.
Daily Times, a Nigerian based Newspaper was also discovered to have run a report with the title “Cold Water and Your Health: Doctors reveal health benefits of warm or cold water”, that included Dr. D. Mensah-Asare claim about the benefit of warm water.
They attributed the source of the report to “message trending on Whatsapp”.
A message to the Editor of Daily Times, Omokioja Julius Eto about the report was not responded to after nine days.
Multiple searches by The ICIR to discover the identity of Dr. D. Mensah-Asare, the doctor to whom the claim was attributed to or any hospital with the name through a google search proved abortive.
A blog post by scurrimania.blogspot.com used an image that The ICIR through a google search discovered to be of a Ghanian Businessman, Asare Akuffo, the former Managing Director of HFC Bank.
Dr. Opeyemi Adeyemi, a medical practitioner at the Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital in Sagamu, Ogun State in an interview with The ICIR said warm water has benefits but doesn’t cure any ailment.
She said though warm water has health benefits, but saying that it cures an ailment, like a disease that is where it is wrong.
“Warm water has benefits but doesn’t cure an ailment. Once somebody has been diagnosed with an ailment, warm water is not going to have any effect or say curing the disease”, she said.
Also, Dr. Femi Ajose of the Olabisi Onabanjo Teaching University Hospital, Shagamu (OOUTH) in an interview with The ICIR said the claim in the pamphlet is a palpable display of folly.
He said, “this is a palpable display of folly! How will just one remedy be a panacea to various ailments? This is highly non-scientific and hence doesn’t hold water, at all. These are just some Myths they sell to people to collect their hard-earned money.”
“This is not to rule out what warm water does, but it hasn’t been proven to be a treatment alternative for any of the above listed.”
“There’s another one they call cellegivity. It’s an antioxidant. Which of course is a good one. But people marketing it went as far as saying it cures Diabetes and Hypertension. They convinced people to stop their routine medications for cellegivity and that caused more harm than good.”
“Anything NOT scientifically proven is HERBAL (alternative) Medicine.”
VERDICT: Based on the above findings, the claim that warm water is 100 percent effective in resolving some health problems is FALSE as The ICIR couldn’t find any medical records to support the claim.
