The Witch Doctor Will See You Now|有请巫医

by Marcus Maurice

Cow urine! Cow urine! Who wants to try some fresh cow urine?

India has long been known as a place of magic and mystery. To Hindus, the cow is the most sacred of all animals, and anything that comes out of it is holy. Normally, milk from cows is drunk for strong teeth and bones, but in India, the elixir of life is cow urine. While that sounds disgusting, cow pee contains phosphate, nitrogen, and all sorts of ingredients that many people say help their health. In India, belief in the healing power of the cow is so strong that cough medicines, ear drops, shampoos, and soaps composed of cow urine are widely available.

Would you drink a soda if the main ingredient were cow urine? What would you do if you were extremely ill and none of the numerous Western medical treatments that you have tried worked? This is the premise of National Geographic Channel's (NGC's) The Witch Doctor Will See You Now. Author and explorer Piers Gibbon travels to exotic locations to find out if some of the world's ancient and most extreme medical practices have any merit. In each episode, he gets two volunteer patients to try these so-called cure-all remedies to see if they alleviate their problems.

While cow urine therapy seems outlandish, it's not the only strange practice that Gibbon and the patients try. In Hong Kong, they eat snake soup and drink field mouse wine at a very famous restaurant. In Cameroon, two patients desperate to get rid of their aches and pains cover themselves in goat's blood before eating the goat to honor it. This month, grasp unfamiliar solutions to health problems on NGC.

有请巫医

牛尿！牛尿喔！有谁想尝尝新鲜的牛尿？

　　印度一直有神奇、神秘的国度之称。对印度人来说，牛是最神圣的动物，任何从牛身上取得的东西都很神圣。饮用牛奶通常是为了有强健的牙齿和骨骼，但在印度，牛的尿液是长生不老之药。虽然这听起来很恶心，但牛的尿液含有磷酸盐、氮，以及许多人说对健康有益的各类成分。在印度，人们对牛有治疗能力深信不疑，以至于随处都可买到含有牛尿配方的咳嗽药、耳滴剂、洗发精和肥皂。

　　要是 1罐汽水的主要成份是牛尿，你喝得下去吗？那要是你病得很重，而任何 1 种西医疗法都没有效的话，你会怎么做？这就是国家地理频道《有请巫医》节目的前提。作家兼探险家皮尔斯‧吉本到异地旅行，查明世界上一些古老且非常极端的医疗习惯是否有任何可取之处。每集节目中，都有 2 名病患自愿尝试这些所谓药到病除的万灵丹，看看是否真能减轻他们的病症。

　　虽然牛的尿疗法看来非常奇特，但这并不是吉本跟病患唯一尝试过的怪异疗法。他们在香港 1 家著名餐厅喝蛇汤跟田鼠酒。在喀麦隆，2名极度渴望摆脱病痛的病患在把羊吃掉前，先在自己身上涂满羊血以示尊敬。这个月跟着国家地理频道，一同来了解你我所不熟悉的疾病疗法吧。

尿疗法是指用尿液来治疗疾病以及增进健康，是 1 种未经医学证实的民间疗法。1990年日本医师中尾良一曾出版 1 本关于尿疗法的书籍，他表示用尿来治病在印度有 5 千年的历史，在欧洲则有 4 千年，此书在全世界引起尿疗法的话题。尿疗法而后渐为人所熟悉。

一般来说，尿疗法只会喝起床后的第 1 次小便，而且只喝中段，而不喝头尾 2段。亦有人建议可把尿液混合果汁一起饮用。（数据源：维基百科）