THE NATION
For 56-year-old Mrs. Bolatito Akanni, consuming the local herbal substance ‘àdìmenu’ is an addiction. She has been drinking it for more than five years and it has begun to tell on her body organs.
Mrs. Bolatito, who is now experiencing failure with one of her body organs after medical diagnosis, recalled that “when I am sick, especially when I’m down with pains in my body, I just go to my herbs sellers’ shop in Isheri, Lagos and complain about how I am feeling. They will give me different herbal combinations like àdìmenu, among others.
“I have never entered any pharmacy to complain about my medical issues because I strongly believe in herbs. I will just tell them how I feel and they will give me àdìmenu to use.”
Just like Mrs. Bolatito, other proponents and sellers of àdìmenu see it as a panacea of a sort. It is commonly referred to as gbogbo-nì-se in local dialect — one-drug-cure-all.
The spread of àdìmenu is undoubtedly aided by the fact that the substance is largely and ignorantly misconstrued as an effective and efficient herbal mixture. However, numerous researches have shown that there are health-threatening short and long-term effects on one’s health after consumption, especially for those addicted to it.
For many who have tasted the mixture, when it is taken, the substance sometimes causes sudden, violent, irregular movement of the body and contraction of muscles. It leaves users weak, severely dehydrated, unconscious and in a few instances, dead.
Nicotiana tabacum is an herbaceous plant mostly known as tobacco. Locally, people do extract this plant and mixed with cow urine, they call it “àdìmenu”, claiming it is effective in managing various ailments, even with just a spoonful of the extract.
Another factor that has aided the prevalence of àdìmenu is its affordable price. The substance is readily available at local herbal centres at very cheap rates across markets. With a bottle sold between N600 and N1000, adimenu is affordable even for low-income earners.
Our correspondent visited some stores in Lagos, especially Mushin, Oshodi and Egbeda to ask for the herbal mixture, and the sellers in seperate reactions said they had many people patronising them for the mixture. Just like many other herbal concoctions, it is most commonly taken by indigent people.
At one of the shops, the adimenu concoction, composed of various shapes and sizes of the packaged concoction was neatly arranged. One of the sellers, Mrs. Barakat, said the product promotes wellness and helps to address various ailments.
While encouraging passers-by to try her products, she said: “Adimenu serve as preventive measures; take them to cleanse your body system and balance your hormones. They even boost your immune system.”
The bottle contains information on ingredients, a list of ailments it can cure, dosage, storage information, registration number, company details and telephone numbers.
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