There is no scientific evidence to prove that a health drink made of Indian date leaves, sacred fig leaves, and Cynodon leaves can cure HIV.

A YouTube video with over a hundred thousand views claims that “HIV patients can be cured within 9 weeks if they daily take a health drink which is made up of Indian date leaves, sacred fig leaves and Cynodon leaves”. However, there is no scientific evidence to prove this.

The person in the video claims himself as an independent scientist and goes on to explain that “Indian date leaves have wonderful ingredients which can cure HIV. HIV patients will be cured within 9 weeks if they take a health drink which is made up of Indian date leaves, sacred fig leaves and Cynodon leaves daily.”

The Indian date leaves have medicinal uses but are not a cure. According to the research paper titled ‘Diverse application of Phoenix sylvestris: A potential herb’ written by Pankaj Jain, Sonika Jain has mentioned that different parts of this plant exhibit diverse medicinal properties such as being antipyretic (lower body temperature), cardiotonic, laxative (something that has strengthening effect on the heart), diuretic and antioxidant.

But there is no mention that Indian date leaves can cure diseases.

Similarly, sacred fig and Cynodon leaves may have beneficial properties but there is no scientific evidence that they can cure HIV/AIDS.

Responding to the above claim Dr. Mukut Bhowmick, an HIV physician & senior program manager for the NACO program at Public Health Foundation of India explained “as of now there is no cure for HIV/AIDS but only treatment. The only treatment for HIV/AIDS is antiretroviral therapy (ART). There is a lot of research going on HIV/AIDS daily but still, there is no effective medicine for this.”

“No health drink can help anyone to cure HIV/AIDS. This may be misleading for people who are taking treatment for HIV/AIDS” said Dr. Bhowmick.

In fact, AIDS, or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, is the most advanced infection stage of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a pathogen that targets the immune system. There are an estimated 38.0 million people living with HIV at the end of 2019 and the disease has claimed almost 33 million lives so far according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). The WHO highlights that “there is no cure for HIV infection. However, effective prevention interventions are available”.

Antiretroviral treatment (ART) is a key treatment to preventing deaths from AIDS. ART is a mixture of antiviral drugs that are used to treat people infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Since the first version of ART was introduced in the late 1980s, the treatment has saved millions of lives.