Urine therapy or treatment by drinking urine is often discussed in various mass media such as television, newspapers, radio, YouTube, etc. Books promoting urine as medicine are also sold in various bookstores. In its promotion it is stated that urine contains substances that are useful for human health, urine is often called "golden blood" and "elixir of longevity" indicating its therapeutic potential. For thousands of years various civilizations (Egyptian, Roman, Jewish, Greek) documented the existence of therapeutic practices using urine. However, along with developments in technology and research in the health sector, it seems we need to review whether urine is really healthy or healing?
The origins of urine therapy can be traced to its first practice in India. The Damar Tantra, a 5000-year-old Hindu religious scripture, documents the first diagnostic and therapeutic approach using urine. The Susruta Samhita, and various other books commonly used by the ancient Tibetan and Hunza cultures in India, describe 10 types of urine based on differences in appearance. Various religions such as Judaism and Catholicism recommend the use of urine based on interpretations of their respective scriptures. Various civilizations also used urine as a basis for diagnosis, from pregnancy to tuberculosis. Therapy using urine itself was first documented in Japan in the 14th century, where urine was then used to treat hypertension, asthma and diabetes. In the early 18th century in Paris, dentists at that time prescribed their patients' own urine as a treatment for several dental and oral problems. Parisians at that time also commonly consumed urine in an effort to avoid disease outbreaks.1
However, current evidence suggests that the safety and benefits of urine therapy are still questionable. Several studies have found the presence of bacteria, some of which are resistant to antibiotics, in human and animal urine. 2-4 Consuming camel urine, which is common in Saudi Arabia, actually exposes consumers to the risk of infection with the Bruscella type of bacteria and the MeRS-CoV virus. .5-8 These findings are not surprising, because in all living creatures there is normal flora that lives around the genital organs. Drinking or applying urine to parts of the body such as the eyes, skin and hair increases the risk of infection from these normal flora. Thus, based on currently available evidence, it can be concluded that using urine to improve health may actually result in disease.
Even though there have been many studies analyzing urine content, both human urine and animal urine, in the context of applying urine as a treatment, these studies are still in vitro (experiments in the laboratory using human body cells) or in vivo (experiments in the laboratory using cells animal body).9-13 It should be understood that the benefits found in in vitro research do not necessarily prove that animal urine is beneficial for human health, because the application to one cell is very different from the application to the human body which consists of different organ systems. complex. To be able to say with confidence that consuming urine is a safe and beneficial action for humans requires research in the form of clinical trials, where urine therapy will be compared with a treatment that is commonly used or with a placebo, its effects will be studied on experimental animal subjects and then also tested on humans, using good and correct research principles and processes such as double-blind clinical trials (RCT).
Reference:
Savica V, Calò L, Santoro D, Monardo P, Mallamace A, Bellinghieri G. Urine therapy through the centuries. Journal of Nephrology. 2011;24(Suppl. 17):123-125.
Ogunshe A, Fawole A, Ajayi V. Microbial evaluation and public health implications of urine as alternative therapy in clinical pediatric cases: health implication of urine therapy. Pan African Medical Journal. 2010;5(1).
Ahamad S, Alhaider A, Raish M, Shakeel F. Metabolomic and elemental analysis of camel and bovine urine by GC–MS and ICP–MS. Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences. 2017;24(1):23-29.
Schmidt K, Mwaigwisya S, Crossman L, Doumith M, Munroe D, Pires C et al. Identification of bacterial pathogens and antimicrobial resistance directly from clinical urines by nanopore-based metagenomic sequencing. Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. 2016;72(1):104-114.
Gossner C, Danielson N, Gervelmeyer A, Berthe F, Faye B, Kaasik Aaslav K et al. Human-Dromedary Camel Interactions and the Risk of Acquiring Zoonotic Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus Infection. Zoonoses and Public Health. 2014;63(1):1-9.
Omrani A, Al-Tawfiq J, Memish Z. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV): animal to human interaction. Pathogens and Global Health. 2015;109(8):354-362.
Samir A, Soliman R, El-Hariri M, Abdel-Moein K, Hatem M. Leptospirosis in animals and human contacts in Egypt: broad range surveillance. Revista da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical. 2015;48(3):272-277.
Ali M, Shehata M, Gomaa M, Kandeil A, El-Shesheny R, Kayed A et al. Systematic, active surveillance for Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus in camels in Egypt. Emerging Microbes & Infections. 2017;6(1):1-7.
Alhaidar A, Abdel Gader A, Mousa S. The Antiplatelet Activity of Camel Urine. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. 2011;17(9):803-808.
Al-Yousef N, Gaafar A, Al-Otaibi B, Al-Jammaz I, Al-Hussein K, Aboussekhra A. Camel urine components display anti-cancer properties in vitro. Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 2012;143(3):819-825.
Romli F, Abu N, Khorshid F, Syed Najmuddin S, Keong Y, Mohamad N et al. The Growth Inhibitory Potential and Antimetastatic Effect of Camel Urine on Breast Cancer Cells In Vitro and In Vivo. Integrative Cancer Therapies. 2016;16(4):540-555.
Funk A, Goutard F, Miguel E, Bourgarel M, Chevalier V, Faye B et al. MERS-CoV at the Animal–Human Interface: Inputs on Exposure Pathways from an Expert-Opinion Elicitation. Frontiers in Veterinary Science. 2016;3.
Abuelgasim K, Alsharhan Y, Alenzi T, Alhazzani A, Ali Y, Jazieh A. The use of complementary and alternative medicine by patients with cancer: a cross-sectional survey in Saudi Arabia. BMC Complemtary and Alternative Medicine. 2018;18(1).
(SSi, CEEBM, 12 Maret 2019)
