indica News Bureau-
An Indian-American physician in Kansas City has begun an experiment to see if prayers can heal coronavirus. The study being undertaken by him aims to initiate God into healing those who got infected through something called “remote intercessory prayer”.
The physician, Dhanunjaya Lakkireddy began a four-month-long prayer study on May 1, with 1000 patients of COVID-19, who are in ICUs. The study will not change the prescribed standard of treatment of the patients but they will be divided in two groups of 500. The physician and his team will offer prayers to one of the groups, but neither of the two groups will be informed about the prayers.
Lakkireddy, describing his religious and spiritual background, said that while he was “born into Hinduism,” but he also attended a Catholic school and had spent time in synagogues, Buddhist monasteries, and mosques, affirming his faith.
The four-month study will investigate “the role of remote intercessory multi-denominational prayer on clinical outcomes in COVID-19 patients,” according to a description provided to the National Institutes of Health, reported Deccan Chronicle.
The patients for the study were chosen randomly and half of them, one group of 500 patients, will receive “universal” prayer offered in five denominational forms — Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism — while the other patients will constitute the control group.
Lakkireddy has assembled a steering committee of medical professionals to oversee the study as all the patients will be given the standard of care prescribed by their medical providers.
“We all believe in science, and we also believe in faith,” Lakkireddy said, adding, ” If there is a supernatural power, which a lot of us believe, would that power of prayer and divine intervention change the outcomes in a concerted fashion? That was our question.”
The investigators will assess how long the patients remain on ventilators, how many suffer from organ failure, how quickly they are released from intensive care and how many die, Lakkireddy said.
The physician said he cannot explain how people praying remotely for someone they don’t know (or a group of people,) could actually make a difference in their health outcome…
Lakkireddy said he has no idea what he will find, “but it’s not like we’re putting anyone at risk. A miracle could happen. There’s always hope, right?”
