YOU CAN DEFEAT COVID-19WITH PRECAUTIONS, PREVETIONS AND PRAYERS
“Let us praise the victorious, all-pervading powerful God, Who leads us on the right path, and prolongs the days of our life”
- Sama Veda
You have to grow from the inside out. None can teach you, None can make you spiritual. There is no other teacher, but your own soul.
- Swami Vivekanand
Happiness cannot be travelled to owned, earned or worn. It is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.
- Denis Waitley
Being spiritual is a far more intelligent way to exist. It means being in tune with the intelligence of the creator.
- Sadhguru
Corona virus is an infective agent which causes COVID-19 (corona virus disease 2019). It causes respiratory tract infection. COVID-19 started recently from Wuhan province of China and now has involved more than 150 countries.
COVID-19 spreads by droplet in air and by contact. Social distancing is the basic factor to contain the virus. Common symptoms are fever, cough with coryza, headache and bodyache. It can also have throat pain and shortness of breath and neglected cases can develop pneumonia. If the disease is not in control then it can eventually lead to multiple organs failure and death. Usually the symptoms are mild and common, which leads to negligence and delayed diagnosis. Death rate at present is 3.4% but it can reach upto 15% if the patient has some comorbidities like diabetes, hypertension, heart and kidney diseases.
There is no curative treatment for COVID-19 so prevention is the only goal.
Following preventive measures can protect you.
1. Frequently hand washing with soap and water helps to keep virus away. Wash hands for 20 seconds. To count 20 seconds just say slowly, “Happy Birthday to You” three times. Soap layer on the surface of virus breaks the fat covering and destroys the virus and then water washes the remains out to drain.
2. Clean hands with sanitizer. Alcohol also destroys the virus like soap but soap is better than alcohol. CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) recommends alcohol in sanitizers should be atleast 60%.
3. Social distancing – maintaining distance of atleast 1 metre from others. Keep distance, but stay connected.
4. Avoid touching face.
5. Using mask when going to crowded places or by a suspected person or care giver. General population do not require use of mask. Mask can be made ordinary cloth
6. Restrict travels.
7. Cover the mouth with elbow when coughing
8. Screening at airports and train and bus stations.
9. Namaste instead handshake.
10. Closure of schools and colleges.
11. Closure of shopping malls, theatres and game stadiums.
13. Self isolation – Any suspected person or who travelled to a country recently with wide spread disease should be kept in self-isolation at home for 14 days from the time of last possible exposure.
Don’t fall prey to superstitious beliefs as happened in Bangladesh on 18th March, 25,000 people gathered in an open field to recite healing verses from Quran to rid of deadly virus. A man in Varanasi was arrested for claiming that his mantras could cure COVID-19. Don’t believe fake news and WhatsApp messages of suspected sources.
Spiritual practices help to reduce distress and panic in COVID-19 patient and others. It also focuses on unannounced questions such as what is purpose of our lives. During self isolation or quarentine read spiritual and inspirational books which may fill your heart, and soul with positive thoughts and courage. Reading of spiritual scriptures, prayer and meditation, deep abdominal breathing, yoga and visualization will help you to calm down and develop strength to fight with COVID-19.
For the past 20 years, western medicine in the United States of America has been exploring uncharted territory: The healing power of spirituality. Now, many medical colleges include classes on spirituality. Belief in spirituality, religion and God has strong roots in India, with 95 per cent of Indians believing that their prayers will be answered.
Now it is an established fact that our thinking affects our functioning of body and even health. Healthy thinking gives good health and negative thinking gives diseases. Mental, emotional factors along with healthy habits like a balance diet and regular physical exercise can not only improve our immunity but can also turn the genes on and improve health as wrote Dr. Dean Ornish, world famous cardiologist, in his book The Spectrum. Imagery is a body and mind healing phenomenon. Just by making a mental picture of good health and experiencing it will produce healing substances in the body, when subconscious mind believes, the conscious mind works like that. A study has shown that the patients of melanoma (a form of cancer) who received coaching and education had 20 percent less mortality than those who did not. They also had improved immunity (measured in T cell levels), better functioning, decreased depression and anxiety, and increased sense of self-efficacy.1
Meditation is a safe and simple way to balance a person’s physical, emotional and mental states. It is easy to learn and can be useful for treating stress and pain. Meditation is for everybody. Age or sex is no bar. One can meditate from childhood to old age. It is not a religion-based practice since people of all faiths can do it.
Deep abdominal breathing is a good practice to clean your lungs and make them more healthy which is a must when you wish to prevent COVID-19 which affects lungs primarily.
Technique of Deep Abdominal Breathing:
When we are in stress we breathe from the chest and it is shallow breathing. When we breathe from the diaphragm (abdominal), it is deep breathing. Shallow or chest breathing doesn’t utilise 10-15 percent of lung capacity, so there is less oxygen in the blood, and also less vitality and freshness.
•Stand or sit or lie down.
•Inhale deeply from the diaphragm, pushing out the abdomen without moving your chest and count 1, 2, 3, 4 slowly in your mind while inhaling.
•Hold your breath by counting 1 to 16 in your mind.
•Exhale by pushing the abdomen in and not moving the chest and counting from 1 to 8 in your mind.
Repeat it five times.
Fear, anxiety and panic response are common among COVID-19 suspects, COVID-19 patients, caregivers, family members and friends. This stress can lead to fear and, extreme worry, altered sleeping patterns, eating disorders and enhanced alcohol consumption. Such degree of stress, can even worsen the preexisting comorbidities such as diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and renal problems and also can lower the immunity and increase your chances to get COVID-19. Spiritual practices make you peaceful, anxiety and stress free and more resistant and strong.
Mrs. Priya, suffered with cold, flu, headache, mild fever, bodyache and mild breathing trouble. She was tested for COVID-19 and found positive. She was anxious and fearful of dying from it. Doctors advised her to remain calm, have good nutritious diet, vitamin supplements and symptomatic treatment, but she was panicking so, a psychologist was also consulted who started training her for yoga and meditation. This gave her inner strength and self-confidence. She started doing yoga and meditation along with other advices by the physician. She gradually improved and came out of COVID-19 and stress in 4 weeks. Now she is doing yoga and meditation regularly and is happy, calm and positive.
Spirituality and its practices increase courage, determination, will power and concentration, which such situations require.
What you can do at home during self-isolation?
1. Talk to family members and explain about COVID-19 and that it is a preventable disease.
2. Become a role model for family by eating well, sleeping well and exercising well.
3. Eat a satwik diet (plenty of fruits and vegetables along with low fat dairy products).
4. Do not allow negativity to affect you and your family.
5. Talk in positive and encouraging manners.
6. Reassure that everybody is safe.
7. Do meditation, yoga and visualization and teach family members also.
8. Pray together.
9. Do not allow family to see only COVID-19 talks all the time on TV. See comedies and laughter shows also.
Set an example to the world by handling well the COVID-19 with our inner strength, firm determination and labour. We have to stand as one united nation.
Be careful, not fearful
80% persons with COVID-19 will require no treatment as such and will recover on their own and only 20% may be hospitalized. Only a small percentage of persons will require admission in ICU.
Myths about COVID-19:
1. COVID-19 can be transmitted by eating eggs, chicken and meat.
No, its not true. Properly cooked food cannot transmit the disease.
2. COVID-19 can be transmitted through pets.
No, it is untrue.
3. Alcohol consumption kills virus.
No, it is not true.
4. Sunlight kills virus.
No.
COVID-19 doesn’t differentiate between countries, religions, gender, rich and poor and educated and uneducated. Famous people like Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Roody Gobert, Sophie Trudeau (Wife of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau), Prince Elbert II of Monaco are suffering with COVID-19.
Holistic medicine is once again emerging. A recent medical review of more than 1200 studies supports this trend.2 At least two-third of these studies document significant association between religious activity and better mental health, better physical health, or lower use of health care services.
Today, there is a rapidly growing body of scientific literature documenting the value of this ancient wisdom. Research confirms that patients who actively participate in spiritual practice are much more likely to recover from a serious illness than those who do not.3 Americans have always believed in spiritual or religious practices, and now that there is mounting scientific evidence supporting its value, we are relying on it even more to assist us in many areas of health care.
It has been confirmed that meditation strengthens the immune system. In a research conducted by Dr. David Cresswell, University of California, USA, 67 HIV patients were studied, where 48 patients practiced regular meditation. The study included male, African, American, homosexuals, unemployed and those not on ARV (Anti Retro Viral) medication. They followed a stress lowering program called “Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Meditation”. The more frequently volunteers meditated, the higher was their CD4T-cell count.
Larry Dossey, MD, feels that immunity enhancing practices such as prayer, meditation and guided visualization should be a part of the treatment strategy of all prognostically poor and chronic diseases.
Prayer is a powerful tool that can help you get your mind out of the way to connect with spirit. There are a multitude of studies documenting that religious participation, especially through prayer, is associated with improvement in many diseases. Studies have been showing that among patients with a wide variety of chronic conditions, those who are the most spiritually connected have the best outcomes.4
Carry home message is that, “stay at home, stay connected, take precautions, exercise well, eat well, think positive, meditate and pray for yourself and others”.
Bibliography
1. F.I. Fawzy et.al., “Malignant Melanoma. Effects of a Early Structured Psychiatric Intervention, Coping, and Affective State on Recurrence and Survival 6 Years Later,” Archives of General Psychiatry 50, no.9 (Sepetember 1993): 681-689.
2. H.G.Koenig et al., Handbook of Religion and Health: A Century of Research Reviewed (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
3. T.E. Oxman, D.H. Freeman, and E.D. Manheimer, “Lack of Social Participation or Religious Strength and Comfort as Risk Factors for Death after Cardiac Surgery in the Elderdly,” Psychosomatic Medicine 57 (1995):5-15.
4. J. Kass et al., “Health Outcomes and a New Index of Spiritual Experience,” Journal of Scientific Study and Religion 30 (1991):203-211.
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