Kozhikode Mayor Beena Philip is reported to have skipped a meeting on Sunday that discussed the advantages of urine therapy after public health activists raised objections to it.
According to sources, the event was organised by Kerala Sivambu Padhana Koottayma, a collective of urine therapy practitioners, whose theme is ‘Urine, water for life’. It was to commemorate P.N. Das, writer and naturopathy practitioner, and to honour T. Narayanan Vattoli, who translated J.W. Armstrong’s Water for Life to Malayalam as Urine Therapy , with the ‘Sreschtacharya Award’. Ms. Philip was supposed to open the event in which practitioners of urine therapy explained their experiences.
However, several people including Manoj Komath, scientist at the Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology, Thiruvananthapuram, wrote to the Mayor pointing out that it was an attempt to “glorify urine therapy”, which was a “primitive habit”. He said Mr. Das, who was a well-known writer about health, had been a follower of urine therapy in his later years. However, it did not help treat his health issues and he had to depend on government health facilities.
Mr. Komath said it was not clear who authored Water for Life and there was no scientific validity for the treatment methods described in the book. It claims that drinking urine and applying it on the body can even cure infertility and cancer. Such claims were against medical ethics and the laws governing the health sector. Scientists had already rejected most of the claims on urine therapy after thoroughly studying them, he said.
The Campaign Against Pseudo Science Using Law and Ethics (CAPSULE), a forum under the Kerala Sasthra Sahithya Parishad, also wrote to Ms. Philip, saying that urine therapy had not been scientifically proved. Both the letters urged the Mayor not to attend the event. Sources said writer U.K. Kumaran inaugurated the event.
Published - March 14, 2021 11:57 pm IST
