Coronavirus live updates: Lab leak ‘extremely unlikely,’ WHO investigators in Wuhan say
Venezuela’s Maduro pushes miracle cure while the country has no vaccines
By Ana Vanessa Herrero and Anthony Faiola
CARACAS, Venezuela — The president announced the “medical breakthrough” with a pitch that could school a QVC presenter.
Neutralize the coronavirus without a single side effect! No needle? No problem! Just a few drops of the magic liquid under the tongue every four hours and it’s goodbye lockdown, hello good health.
“From Venezuela to the world,” Nicolás Maduro declared in a national address, unveiling two shimmering vials of Carvativir.
Venezuelan medical professionals now say that Maduro’s “miracle drops” — which he pledged would rapidly go into mass production — are actually an extract of the herb thyme, used in homeopathic therapies and ordinary cooking.
Yet one aspect of the marketing blitz did ring true. More than any other nation in the Western Hemisphere, this broken socialist state might need a miracle to defeat the novel coronavirus.
Faiola reported from Miami.
