Agbo, a Yoruba name for herbal concoction or infusion prepared from a variety of herbs and roots or barks of trees, is going neck to neck in a steep competition with orthodox drugs.
Agbo seems to be getting the upper hand among Nigerians. This herbal brew is taken for various ailments common in Nigeria but popularised and commercialised, by the Yoruba people.
There have been concerns raised about its safety and efficacy for the treatment of diseases.
21st CENTURY CHRONICLE set out to find out the experience of users and the qualification of the sellers who flourish all over the FCT.
Magic powers of Agbo
Mr. Bashir Kehinde an auto-mechanic in Area 3, shared his experiences with 21st CENTURY CHRONICLE.
“Agbo is exceptionally good, and I am an
advocate of it, I have used it since childhood when my mother will go to the market and buy it for us the boys.
“I am triplet (all boys) and it is traditional to Yoruba people to prepare special Agbo for young boys to give them stamina and strength. It is curative in nature unlike orthodox drugs that are mere suppressants of illnesses.
“My wife just contacted an Agbo lady who
promised to cure me of my hypertension permanently. I am tried of constantly taking drugs and my wife said she said N2000 will be enough to buy it.”
He further said that he is mindful of dosage and always asks if the sellers are sure of the amount and that he questions them to ensure they are experienced.
“Pomo is necessary to reduce the effect of hangover for roots infused in alcohol. I do not take the alcoholic Agbo because of my hypertension.
“As a man, when I feel weak and bedroom performance is of concern to me, I take it to get ready. Women hate this bedroom disappointment you know,” Bashir said.
“Agbo Jeddi is a reliable ‘Manpower’, it washes sugar from the body,” he quipped.
Mr. Samaila Ojo, another user, responding to the question of efficacy of Agbo and its side effects if he has experienced any, said they work well for him and he has never felt any associated side effect because “these are natural things put together.”
Samaila also said he believes the orthodox drugs at best suppress malaria and malaria seems to be developing resistance to them. With herbs he said, he stays for as long as 9 months or 1 year before he needs
treatment again.
“What I do in the hospital is to run tests after
taking the herbs to ensure that the fever is gone.”
He also said it is useful for aphrodisiac purposes.
“I use it occasionally when I feel I am not strong enough to meet up my wife’s expectation or my other woman. The village Agbo is more trustworthy, I sometimes
nurse concerns that the urban Agbo sellers may be mixing it with painkillers.”
Victor Albert said he uses Agbo with utmost caution.
“I know what I want from the sellers and I ask specifically for it. I do not take the excessively bitter mixture it can affect the liver, kidneys and other vital organs, I heard.”
He advised that anyone who wants to take Agbo should research and know what he wants before using it.
How Agbo s prepared – Madam Aishat
Zainab, an Agbo peddler said she is still under training and cannot speak.
She said she was given the prepared herbs by her madam with the dosage required.
Her Madam, Aishat, has this to say about how she prepares it.
“For typhoid, I use the bark of mango tree. The outer part is peeled off and the white part is soaked for some days to soften, it is pounded and the milky sap of it is sieved to make antidote for typhoid.”
On dosage, she said it depends on the severity of the typhoid and that she can tell if it is high from the patient’s eyes.
“If the white part of the eye has a greenish hue, I know typhoid is high and the patient takes the juice with alabukun on the first day.
“The subsequent days, it is taken with milk because alabukun can lower blood count. The dosage is about 500ml twice daily.”
For malaria, Madam Aishat said she makes a concoction of neem, mango, orange leaves and lemon grass in careful proportion.
“We sometimes infuse the herbs in alcohol, but I always recommend water-based infusion which is what I take myself.
“For bedroom challenges, I use Ale (Carpolobia) for strong erection and long-lasting performance. Usually, this is mixed with Agbo Jedi which washes toxins and sugar from the body and enhances male sexual performance.”
I walk six-hour long selling Agbo – Halimat
Halimat is an Agbo seller who confessed that she could sustain a six-hour long walk traversing Abuja selling these herbs.
“This is because I take Agbo on daily basis
and it is healthy, especially the malaria mix.”
When asked why stewed cow hide (pomo) is always sold alongside Agbo, she said it helps with hangover and clears the mouth from the lasting taste of the herbs and nothing more.
Halimat peddles her Agbo in Area 1, Abuja and vouches for its efficacy.
“I am from Okene and I went all the way to Ondo to train for Agbo business. It is good and I recommend that people use it,” she said.
Pointing to two roots which she said are barks of trees even though she did not know their names, she said “We call them roots and it is only the skilled Agbo sellers that gives us. They source it from the village.
“We sometimes treat STDs in men and women.
“In this business, you cannot just jump in, you have to be identified through a serial number that can be traced to the person you trained under. The association ensures that we comply with the ethics.”
21st CENTURY CHRONICLE reports that in the interaction with over 10 Agbo sellers, all their herbs were the same. Mostly the malaria mix, Agbo jeddi, the mango sap milk for typhoid and the bark that has red colouring, and a bark that exudes green substance when infused (the later names are unknown even to the sellers).
Madam Ngozi Nnebedum from Anambra said she can vouch for Agbo.
“It has helped me stay strong. I take it at least 3 times in a week. In this my business of hawking Okpa, I used to get tired easily but not anymore,” she said.
“I trust it because my mum used to make herbal concoctions for me and it didn’t harm me,” she added.
Nnebedum further stated that the people that sell Agbo are skilled and even babies’ fragile systems are not harmed by them.
Agbo can lead to kidney disease – Doctor
Dr Ihuoma Obineche, the Medical Director Belmont Hospital, Kaduna, spoke to 21s CENTURY CHRONICLE on the use of herbs by Nigerians. He said Agbo is not the only culprit as all sorts of things are paraded as having “Herbal Cures”.
“Herbs have huge potentials in helping to fight diseases but not in the unregulated way we are going about it in Nigeria. We need to deliberately research these herbs and pass them through laid down standard international protocols before we use them for diseases treatment or management.
Dr. Obineche said China has recorded strides in herbal medicine because they research it before use.
He emphasised that some of these herbs can have one active ingredient and several toxic ones.
“The Chinese extract the active useful components and discard the toxic ones. Drugs are essentially made from plants in an open professional and thorough process unlike how these herbal cures are shrouded in secrecy,” he said.
Obineche observed that typhoid which Nigerians are always using these herbal cures to “treat” is not even as prevalent as they say.
“In the last 30 years, I have not had a case in my hospital. People exposed to unclean water can be healthy carriers of the disease after recovering from it. Nigerians do not wash their hands often, salmonella the bacteria that causes typhoid can be passed on to the hand of a healthy carrier through stool.
“It can then latch to food and be passed on to others. Food sellers mostly spread typhoid this way through salmonella contaminated food, fruits, vegetables and cooked food.
“There is an alarming rise in kidney and liver diseases in Nigeria, we experts are attributing this fatal malady to consumption of some of these things.”
