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Bitter truth of Dakshitha & Rajapaksa’s ‘bitter gourd’ cancer meds
The Opposition is planning to raise a question in Parliament about two institutions that have obtained licenses from the Department of Ayurveda for the production of a medicine and a dietary supplement claiming to be for cancer by showing the same research results, Sri Lanka Mirror learns.
They are a capsule by the name ‘α-Elostera’ marketed by Ceylon Green Ayurveda Company as a solution for cancer and made from bitter gourd seeds and a food supplement released to the market as ‘LivingMo 600’ by Prime Health Herbal Products.
However, both the medicine and the food supplement have been made by using the research conducted by a team including Prof. Jayantha Rajapaksa and Professor Anura Jayasuriya of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the Peradeniya University where they have purportedly discovered anticancer activity of bitter gourd seeds.
When Professor Jayantha Rajapaksa is producing the capsule as a food supplement, one Dakshitha Thilanga Sumathipala, a businessman who has no relation to the research, has obtained a license to manufacture the capsule as a medicine.
Experts in the Ayurvedic field said that giving approval by the Ayurveda Formulary Committee for both these endeavors is ludicrous.
Meanwhile, Ceylon Green Ayurveda has blatantly violated several terms set by the Department of Ayurveda when manufacturing the capsule.
The sign board of the ‘Ceylon Green Cancer Wellness Center’ operated by the company located near the Apeksha Hospital to sell this capsule, has not mentioned that it is an Ayurvedic medicine shop.
Accordingly, they have deliberately misled the patients.
An Ayurvedic dispensary must have personnel registered with the Ayurvedic Department and only they can prescribe medicine.
However, the clip below shows how those who contact the company’s phone number can get medicines prescribed by one of its salespersons.
Dakshitha’s Ceylon Green Ayurveda has published advertisements to promote the capsule on the internet without the permission of the Ministry of Health.
Meanwhile, the Ayurveda Formulary Committee has given permission for the capsule and the food supplement when there has been no mention in traditional books on indigenous medicine that bitter gourd has anticancer qualities.
If Professor Rajapaksa intends to use the research results for a product with commercial purposes, he must obtain the permission from the University of Peradeniya which facilitated the research.
Doing so would enable the university to receive an economic advantage but it was revealed during our investigation that there has been no such advantage.
Although Professor Rajapaksa said that the capsule was subjected to a clinical trial post-production, the Ministry of Health and the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) told us that they do not have any evidence of such a clinical trial.
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