Source Magazine Online

A Cure for All Seasons

Patrick

Positive commendations flood in for Elixir-9 , a herbal tincture from Bulgaria, which has proved effective in the treatment of several ailments

By Victor Ogene

In the years following Nigeria's political independence from Britain, Anna Eboweme was one of the icons which symbolised the typical Nigerian woman. Pretty and vivacious, she was crowned Miss Nigeria in 1965, at a period when both the concept of the beauty pageant and the diadem held very much allure. Several years down the line, Anna, who is now Mrs Odey, lives in relative obscurity and with the agony of a personal pain which she has had to endure all alone, away from the klieg-lights. Although still her old good natured personality, Odeh's ability to ‘circulate' even in the small social circle of friends and family members, had been severely circumscribed by a slight condition known in medical circles as pitty-oedema . The problem, which manifests through the swelling of the heels, often causes discomfort in wearing shoes while the swollen part of the body takes several hours to ease off.

Interview

‘ Elixir-9 is the Formula for Good Health'

– Patrick Obinna Nwamerue, chief executive officer, Enyobi Nigeria Ltd., sole distributor of Elixir-9

By Victor Ogene and Chidiebere Onyemaizu

How did you come in contact with Elixir-9?

I came in contact with Elixir-9 through an in-law of the producer of the drug in Bulgaria who informed me about the drug and where it has worked in Africa, that is Zambia. So, along the line he gave me some samples so that we could test and see what the drug is all about. He was particularly talking about HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis because of what he heard about the scourge of the diseases in Africa. But I was not keen about the drug. I didn't take him serious but when I came back with the drug I gave it to a certain woman who was HIV-positive. After five days, the woman called me and was so happy that her rashes, boils and everything had vanished. I gave her another 10 packets of the drug and asked her to continue with it. After sometime, she was okay and went back to her job.

What year was that?

That was about four years ago. So later I stopped giving her because I couldn't continue giving her. I wanted to sell it but the man the (producer) had said I should not sell it. He said I should give it out free to those who are sick, so after the woman, I gave the drug to a man who had pile. The man later came to testify to the efficacy of the drug. Thereafter, I decided to register it with (NAFDAC) the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and control. It took us almost two years to undergo the process and today we are NAFDAC-approved. To be sincere, there are a lot of testimonies concerning this drug which the company is happy about; the issue is not money, rather we want the drug to get to the nooks and crannies of the country, so that Nigerians will be relieved of these persistent minor sicknesses. So we are happy with the drug for now. We have sold it to Taraba State government and a lot of state governments have also indicated interest.

These state governments, what do they use the drug for?

They administer it on personss living with HIV. Taraba State has even indicated interest for more of Elixir-9 . Right now, we are also working with Enugu, Imo and Kaduna States.

How exactly does Elixir-9 work?

Elixir-9 is a herbal preparation whose mechanism of action is unknown, but in cases where the immunity is depressed, it has been found out that it (Elixir-9) improves the CD4 count cell in the body and that the immune system is boosted.

How do you now differentiate anti-retroviral drugs from Elixir-9? What are their meeting grounds if any?

The difference is tha t Elixir-9 has no side effects. Elixir-9 is just natural. It has no chemical agents, whereas anti-retroviral drugs have chemical agents with accompanying side effects.

It does appear as if the drug is only active on diseases that are sexually transmitted. How true is this?

No! Elirir-9 is a multi-therapeutic agent. Because of its uniqueness, it is indicative as an anti-bacterial agent. It is equally good as an anti-malaria agent. It is equally good as an anti-viral agent. It is equally good as an appetite stimulant; indeed, it is a broad-based therapeutic agent. It is not only for sexually transmitted diseases.

You said this preparation has been in Bulgaria for over 20 years. How come it is getting to this parts only now?

Well, if I am to say, it is because most attention in the importation of pharmaceutical products has been focused on Asia, China and India, but today we have this drug because of the extra effort of a Nigerian who travelled to Bulgaria and decided to bring this wonderful herbal product to us. And coming from Bulgaria, an European country there is no doubt that the efficacy of Elixir-9 is guaranteed.

Is Elixir-9 already in the Nigerian Market?

Yes, of course. We made sure that we followed all the laid-down rules prescribed by NAFDAC – making sure that we got all the documentations ready and the drug tested by NAFDAC. We got our NAFDAC number sometimes last year.

So right now, is Elixir-9 sold in open drug stores?

No, it is sold in registered pharmaceutical outlets because we don't want to encourage the idea of sourcing drugs in the open market.

How is Elixir-9 administered?

It could be used as a prophylactic agent. In that case, what it means is that it could be used to prevent diseases. In such instances, it is used one teaspoonful dissolved in 150m glass of water once daily. Because it is nutritional supplement, you can take it as a supplement. But as a chemotherapeutic agent, you administer it one teaspoonful, dissolved in 150m glass of water, three days daily.

Just water?

Well, in any vehicle that can achieve a proper dissolution, in your cup of tea, or other beverages.

Even in a cup of alcoholic drink?

No, because it is already alcohol-based.

You know the HIV/AIDS pandemic in tropical Africa is alarming, such that over the years people have come up with one formulation or the other and there have been several claims from unothordox doctors who say they can handle and cure HIV/AIDS only to fizzle out after a while. Consequently, people have the tendency to begin to suspect any new one. How would you react to this?

Thank you. This is a very nice question. It is one thing that have actually affected the medical profession. But realistically speaking, this is all about science and science is a constant thing. We have scientific data, a scientific chemical trial which has been undergone with this drug in Bulgaria, and from the responses we got, it has been wonderful such that we do not fall under the category of those who make such claims fraudulently. Our drug is different and we can prove it anytime. We challenge people with all manners of illness. People whose immunity have been seriously compromised to visit our outlets, or even come to our office and get Elixir-9 . We are not actually out to make money, our only interest is to continue to help alleviate people's health conditions.

HIV/AIDS is in several stages and types. For example, Type one, Type two before you talk about full-blown AIDS. What category of HIV/AIDS do you think this drug will be able to manage?

Well, as I said before the essence of this drug is to boost the immune system. In a situation whereby your immune system is compromised, we have found out, through clinical trial, that if Elixir-9 is administered over a long period of time, it will help reverse and improve the situation.

Can Elixir-9, therefore, act as a substitute for anti-retroviral drug?

It could be co-administered with anti-retroviral drugs.

Earlier, you said that the drug originated from Bulgaria and that it is herbal. Can't the recipe be found here in Nigeria?

Well, the time has come to tell ourselves the truths, to wit, that herbal medication is not condemnable, it is actually good and is actually undergoing some reformation. Time will come when they (the Bulgarians) will tell us the type of roots they get from the forest to manufacture Elixir-9 . We are actually approaching that level. However, there is a literature on Elixir-9 . Anybody can come to our office and read it.

Are there empirical evidences to show those that who are infected with HIV/AIDS took this drug and got better?

Well, actually I don't know why we are laying emphasis mainly on HIV/AIDS. I will always refer you to the major fact that Elixir-9 is an immune booster. Once your immunity is boosted, you are 100 per cent healthy. You can eat well, you can bounce well, you can stay healthy all through. I am taking it and I can assure you that since I started taking it, I have not been suffering from malaria for the past eight months. So to me, is an anti-malaria drug.

What are the possible side effects of Elixir-9?

It has no side effect.

Nothing at all?

Elixir-9, unlike other drugs has no side effect at all. It is a magic drug.

What responses have you been receiving from consumers of Elixir-9?

As a matter of fact, it has been wonderful. I am happy about that, I am proud of that. We have received several calls. Even recently, on Friday to be precise, a young man came and said he contacted a disease from his girlfriend and could not just understand the nature of the disease. The tip of his genital suddenly became reddish, with rashes all over. He kept taking injections without success. I gave him Elixir-9 in my office and he took some home. The next day he confessed and said, ‘look my, brother everything has vanished. He now demanded to know what it was that cured him. He brought people, his family members, everybody to my office to thank me. One other boy who works as a vulcaniser near my office at OPIC Plaza, beside Sheraton Hotel, Ikeja, had a strange skin disease which was threatening to paralyse one of his legs. The boy took Elixir-9 and later came to buy more. He described Elixir-9 as “ Ebeano ” (the main issue). Imagine a Yoruba boy trying to speak Igbo. When I asked him why he described the drug as “ Ebeano ”, he said he had seen wonders within two days. We are even asking The Source magazine to get us serious cases. We will give them the drug free of charge, so that you will give testimonies too. When you tell people that one drug works for several things, they exclaim, ‘ah! these people don come again,' but these are laymen. They cannot understand. For example, if you tell them that Elixir-9 can also take care of keloids and HIV, they get confused; what's the connection between HIV and keloid, they seem to wonder. So an ordinary man cannot understand you. Our greatest worry is how to let people know. How Nigerians will know that this (Elixir-9) is supposed to be in their houses and even in their offices. That they are supposed to take it for preventive measures because you don't have to get sick before you take Elixir- 9. In any case, everybody is sick in Nigeria. Is it the water, is it the environment, is it the dirt, the food, name it. Everybody is sick here. Recently, we gave a cartoon to the Prisons department, and they were appreciative of this such that they now requested that we should bring more. They now want to buy it.

How affordable is Elixir-9

Our promise to Nigerians is that it is going to be the cheapest immune booster. I will subsidise the cost and make sure every Nigerian has this drug. You will then see that the General Hospitals will have less patients. When President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa said that weak immunity is the problem in Africa and that there is no HIV, they thought that the man was crazy. The truth is that poverty is Africa's problem. Poor feeding.

What is the life span of this drug?

It has a two-year life span.

One is still curious about the dosage for the different array of illnesses it handles. Ordinarily, if you tell somebody that one drug cures A,B,C,D the issue becomes how does the man suffering from malaria take it, how does the person living with HIV take it. In what measure and all that?

It could be individualised in such a way that you should very well know that it is a food supplement and as a food supplement it falls under the category of prophylaxis – that is preventive. Again, just like every medication, pregnant women and breast-feeding mothers should be very cautious in taking the drug. Irrespective of the illness, be it malaria, tuberculosis et cetera, take one teasspoonful dissolved on 150m glass of water two – three times daily.

After a long term of partnership, do you forsee being given a franchise to begin to manufacture the drug here in Nigeria?

As a matter of fact, they are even begging us to do that instantly. But we told them to give us time to source for funds first. We already have a site somewhere in Asaba where we intend to use.

But for now you are the sole agent?

Yes, for Nigeria and Ghana.

What has been the response from Nigerians?

The response has been wonderful. We take down their phone numbers and addresses and we call them on regular basis to ask how they are responding to the drug and their reactions generally.

How many people have come back to report that the drug did not work for them?

Nobody. Because everybody has one problem or the other. You see, those that have headache may come for weak erection and it works for weak erection (general laughter), so something is wrong in everybody. White people have more diseases than Africans but poverty is our problem. For example, how can someone feed on garri for a whole week, non stop? That is the problem.

Although not certain herself when and how this problem developed, help came her way early this year when she came in contact with Elixir-9 , a herbal tincture which ostensibly is the star out of a long range of 770 Elixirs developed and introduced to the world by Nikola Hlebarov, a Bulgarian chemical engineer.

Although widely acknowledged across most parts of Africa especially East Africa, for its excellent prophylactic and curative ability for a number of different diseases, Odey, like several other Nigerians, are getting to come in contact with the ‘magic' drug, which has clearly expressed anti-oxidant activity and act as active stimulators of the body's immune system, through Enyobi Nigeria Limited, run by Patrick Obinna Nwamerue, a Nigerian who was born the same year that Mrs Odey reigned as Miss Nigeria . Nwamerue holds the franchise as the sole importer of Elixir-9 in Ghana and Nigeria.

Patrick, who lost his father, a former member of the old Imo State House of Assembly, when he was just 15 in 1980 had upon completion of his secondary education at Ihie High School, Isiala-Ngwa local government area of Imo State the next year (1981), left for Sophia, Bulgaria where he obtained a Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Industrial Economics from the Higher Institute of Economics, Sophia.

Although he returned to Nigeria 12 years ago, in 1994, to set up an importation agency and haulage business, Nwamerue was to come in contact with Elixir-9 through Stoyan Ganchev, a son-inlaw to the producer of the drug.

“It was Stoyan, a friend of mine and son-inlaw of Nikola Hlebarov, the world acclaimed Bulgarian scientist-inventor of the Elixir range that first told me about the drug ( Elixir-9 ) and how it was working wonders in Africa, particularly in Zambia where a kind of trial by the authorities was going on with the drug. I recall that Stoyan was particularly excited about the effects of Elixir-9 on Persons Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWH) and tuberculosis because of what he had heard regarding the scourge of the diseases in Africa,” Nwamerue told The Source .

Probably because of the worldwide preponderance of claims regarding cure for HIV/AIDS and other related ailments, Nwamerue had simply waved off his friend's boasts about the potency of Elixir-9 and merely tucked away the few samples which his pal insisted he took away. Nwamerue: “Really, I was not keen about the drug as I didn't take Stoyan serious, but all the same I came back with the few samples he gave me. I was so disinterested that I dashed them to a certain woman whom I knew to be HIV-positive, but surprisingly, after five days she called me to say that her rashes, boils and everything had vanished. I gave her another 10 packets from the carton Stoyan gave me and asked her to continue with it. After some time, she felt well enough to go back to her job.”

If that shocked Nwamerue, the response he has been getting since last year when he began importing the drugs into Nigeria has been tremendous. “To be sincere, there are lots of testimonies concerning this drug and that is my major source of happiness. The issue, really is not about money as our intention is to get the drug to every nook and cranny of this country, so that Nigerians would be relieved of the very many persistent illnesses which they confront daily,” Nwamerue told The Source .

Indeed, empirical evidence abound to support his claims. In a letter dated March 8, 2006, Mrs Ifeoma Okpaluba, a deputy controller of prisons at the Kirikiri medium security prisons, Lagos wrote: “In furtherance of the donation of Elixir-9 to our Penal Institution, I am directed to seek for more of the Elixir-9 preparations. The Elixir-9 was found to be of benefit to clients who attested to its use. The clients physical state and well-being were significantly improved.” Okpaluba went on to “solicit for more of the preparation.”

Nwamerue told The Source that already some state governments have begun to introduce Elixir-9 into their health care delivery system. He named some of them as Taraba, Enugu, Imo and Kaduna States.

Outside the shores of Nigeria, other African countries, particularly Zambia, began taking more than cursory notice of Elixir-9 soon after the 13th World Conference on AIDS held in South Africa six years ago. Following a masterly presentation which showed that healthy nutrition has an extremely favourable impact on human health and that Elixirs can successfully replace preservatives (which have often been proven harmful to humans) as well as enrich food products with biologically-active substances, the Zambia Government formally approached the Bulgarian Government “to facilitate the creation of the necessary conditions in order to expand the production capacity of the “Elixirs” by St. Nikola Limited.”

In a letter dated October 30, 2001 and addressed to Nikola Vassilev, the Bulgarian Minister of Economics, and signed by Hon. Levison A. Mumba, MP, Zambia's Minister of Health, the Zambians urged the Bulgarians to “bring their appeal to the attention of the WHO (World Health Organisation) in Bulgaria, for WHO to render assistance to Academician Hlebarov and St. Nikola Limited (as) the Zambian people would be among the many beneficiaries of such increased production capacity for Elixirs .”

Mumba hinged his optimism on the fact that “since the Ministry of Health started working with Academician Nikola Hlebarov, “Elixirs” have been administered on many patients in Zambia (and) we have received numerous submissions about its effectiveness from the hospitals and many people from different places where “Elixirs” have been supplied.”

Pointing out that results confirmed by the “observations of the Ministry of Health and letters of appreciaon addressed to the country's health specialists indicate that the “Elixirs” have good prophylactic potentials and are also harmless to the human body,” the Zambian Health Minister stated that “at present, several Zambian people are using “Elixir” treatment and the indicative information received so far shows improvement in their general conditions. Many of the patients with advanced HIV/AIDS have improved their health.”

Indeed, in a Scientific Report jointly authored by Professor (Dr.) Y. Mihailov of the Bulgarian Ministry of Health and professor (Dr.) V. Mihailova, head of II Children's Surgery Clinic “Pirogov,” using white mice, to show proof of the lack of toxicity of Elixir-9 and proof of the lack of toxic effect of Elixir-9 by means of study of the two basic impact mechanisms: local-irritant effect and effect on the blood-creating system, the results “from the studies so carried out during the routine period show that symptoms like vomiting, stomach-ache, paresis or increased intestinal peristalsis are absent.”

Continuing, the scientific advisers stated in their report dated February 20, 2004 that “ Elixir-9 does not affect the blood creating system and peripheral blood… The continuous administration of the preparationfor 25 days with drinking water does not cause statistically important differences in the total number of leucocytes, spleen weight, general and specific cellularity of the spleen. The results of the experiment show positive impact of Elixir-9 upon antioxidant processes in the organisms of study animals as well.”

Regarding the mutagenity of the product, the results indicated that “ Elixir-9 does not increase the mutation frequency over the level of spontaneous mutations... the preparation does not facilitate the organism to form mutations.”

For Professors Mihailov and Mihailova, therefore, the logical deductions are that “Elixir-9 is a product that is excellently standardised with zero toxicity, not only in vitro but in vivo as well; it does not cause negative effects upon the spleen and marrow, has good protective efficiency, and lacks mutagenuous effect.” They, therefore, recommended “ Elixir-9 as a very good drug with powerful anti-bacterial, anti-viral and immune stimulating effect, with zero toxic effect and without mutagenuous effect. The same drug can be administered not only as prophylaxis but also medicinally and simultaneously with chemical drugs prescribed to the patient by the general practitioner.”

For Chuma Oguene, a trained pharmacist who works with Enyobi Nigeria Limited, “my joy is that we are dealing with science here and science like you know is a constant thing. Elixir-9 has been scientifically tested and proven to be very effective in boosting the immune system. We challenge people with all manners of illness,people whose immunity have been seriously compromised, to visit our outlets, or better still come over to our office at Opic Plaza, beside Sheraton Hotel, Ikeja to get Elixir-9 and attest to its efficacy.”

Obiora Akabogu, a lawyer who claims to be a beneficiary of the curative powers of Elixir-9 described it as a compendium of sorts, which acts as both a stabiliser and a booster. Akabogu told The Source that as shown in the testimonies of Zambians and South Africans, the drug is tropicalised, but importantly, is cost-effective as it takes care of many problems at minimal cost.

His words: “ Elixir-9 as an immune booster has once more brought to the front burner the debate between former US President, Bill Clinton and Thambo Mbeki of South Africa on the actual cause(s) of HIV/AIDS and other immune deficiency-related ailments. It is believed that since this drug ( Elixir-9 ) is an attested immune booster, which is also affordable, terrible diseases which are related to immune deficiency and poverty, should no longer be nightmares to hitherto helpless Nigerians. It is coming at the right-time. Furthermore, this herbal mixture has demonstrated the supremacy of nature over matter.”

Elixirs , which are water-ethanol extractions from different combinations of herbs, works by destroying the protective bacterial mechanisms, enabling it to reach the target localisations in cells, penetrate the cellular membrane and destroy the bacteria. This makes it totally applicable as a successful and effective accompanying preparation in prophylaxis and/or treatment of a number of bacterial infections which often leads to complications such as prostatitis, urethritis, arthritis, hepatitis, inflammation of the ovary tubes, ovaritis, some types of pneumonia and bronchitis.

For those with immune deficiences, has a Daniel, nay Elixir-9 come to judgement? The taste of the pudding might just lie in the eating.