When Public Figures Make Questionable Health Claims, Do People Listen?

President Donald Trump may be the most high-profile head of state promoting untested approaches to coronavirus, but he is not alone on the world stage. Early in March, China's National Health Commission included some traditional Chinese medicine cures on a list of potential treatments for COVID-19. One of those traditional products is tan ri qing, an injectable medicine containing bear bile. Also in March, a top health minister from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist party told reporters that "spending 10 to 15 minutes in the sun can provide vitamin D, boost immunity and kills any kind of virus."

Madagascar's President Andry Rajoelina, according to multiple news reports, has promoted an herbal drink called Covid Organics, which contains artemesia, a bitter root sometimes used to treat malaria. "Tests have been carried out — two people have now been cured by this treatment," Rajoelina said at the launch of COVID-Organics at the Malagasy Institute of Applied Research, which developed the tonic, according to the BBC.