Family resorts to ‘Salt therapy’ to revive dead boy at hospital in Odisha’s Bhadrak

Bhadrak: In yet another case of blind beliefs and superstitions holding sway over minds of people specially in rural areas, ‘salt therapy’ was given to revive a minor boy who died due to drowning in Gandheibindha village of Odisha’s Bhadrak district. Not just that, the ritual was carried out on the premises of the hospital where the boy was declared dead.

As per reports, the body of the one and half year old boy was brought to Basudevpur community health centre where doctors declared him brought dead. However, the family could not come to terms with the minor’s untimely demise and desperately resorted to ‘salt therapy’ which was recommended to them by some relatives who had come across a practitioner claiming that a person who died by drowning can revive if covered in salt for several hours.

Accordingly, the boy’s body was covered in a heap of salt on the hospital premises but to no avail. While the kin of the deceased admitted that the boy could not be revived, hospital authorities denied any such act having taken place on the campus. “We were told by a practitioner that a person can be revived with salt therapy within half an hour of drowning but nothing happened. That was our last hope,” one of the relatives said.

On the other hand, doctors at the hospital dismissed the act and said it is impossible to revive a dead person. Besides, no salt therapy has been carried out here, they said.