Regular intake of 100 percent fruit juice remains the antidote to tackle the coronavirus scourge, Olusola Malomo, a leading nutritionist/Publicity Secretary of the Nutrition Society of Nigeria, has said.
He gave the advice at the CHI Limited-sponsored monthly healthy living dialogue at the weekend.
While noting that Covid-19 is a respiratory infection which causes fever, tiredness, sore throat and in severe cases, shortness of breath and respiratory difficulty, he said that the World Health Organization (WHO) and other global public institutions have confirmed that the severity of the Covid-19 infection is linked with the overall state of the body’s immune system.
Citing the Harvard Medical School in its Harvard Health Publishing, Malomo revealed that deficiency in Zinc, Iron, Copper, Folic Acid, Vitamins A, B6, C (which is contained in large quantities in fruit juice) and E have negative impacts on immune responses.
He said: “CNN reported that the United States retail sales of orange juice jumped about 38 percent in the four weeks ending on March 28, 2020, when compared to the same period last year. Also, the Florida Department of Citrus disclosed that there was a spike in demand for 100% orange juice within the same period.”
“During the five weeks the Federal Capital Territory, Lagos and Ogun were on lockdown, shops and supermarkets had run out of orange fruit juice stock in the first two or three weeks of the restriction.”
“In fact, less than a week into the lockdown, my favorite Chivita 100% real orange fruit juice which would have made the stay-at-home less boring for me, had rapidly been purchased off the shelves in Lagos. The scramble for unavailable raw fruits in the open markets started in earnest as the restriction on movement cut off a large chunk of the supplies.”
