COVID-19 Pandemic - Perspective through Unani Medicine

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus has rapidly spread around the world causing an outbreak of acute infectious pneumonia. Currently, combating COVID-19 is the most important task for the World, which also raises a global alert. The SARS-CoV-2 virus has been isolated from asymptomatic individuals, and affected patients continue to be infectious two weeks after cessation of symptoms. The substantial morbidity and socioeconomic impact have necessitated drastic measures across all continents, including nationwide lockdowns and border closures. The two basic theories of the Unani System of Medicine related to the causation of diseases depending on the mode of origin are i) Imbalance of the humors born inside the body and ii) Invasion of foreign bodies, which attack the humors. Infectious and epidemic diseases belong to the second category. There are various preventive measures mentioned in ancient literature for epidemic conditions. Avicenna described Amraz-e- Wabai (Epidemic disease) in Canon of medicine and recommended to stay at home or Al-Arba’Iniya during an epidemic situation. Rhazes(Al-Razi) had an idea of Quarantine. In this review, we aimed to collect information related to COVID-19 and to provide an impact over World and also highlighted the ideas of Greco-Arab (Unani) physicians on the above topic intending to pinpoint the utility of pharmacological groups of the drugs used by them for the treatment and prevention of infectious and epidemic diseases.