Natural remedy use for COVID-19 surveyed among United Arab Emirates adults

When the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the world in early 2020, pharmacies emptied of vitamins, honey sales surged, and social media filled with recipes for herbal concoctions that promised protection against an unprecedented viral threat. Now, a new study from the United Arab Emirates offers a detailed snapshot of how one nation’s population actually used and perceived natural remedies during that turbulent period, and the findings challenge many assumptions about the scale of alternative medicine use during a global health crisis.

Researchers at the University of Sharjah conducted a cross-sectional survey between February and March 2021, targeting UAE residents aged 18 and above. The study, published in BMC Complementary Medicine and Therapies, gathered responses through self-administered questionnaires distributed via social media platforms, a distribution method that reflected the lockdown conditions under which the data was collected. After analysis using SPSS statistical software, version 26, the team found that while natural remedies were deeply embedded in everyday health practices before the pandemic, they played a surprisingly modest role in COVID-19 prevention and treatment specifically.

The numbers tell a nuanced story. Before the pandemic, a striking 74.6 percent of the 382 participants analyzed reported using natural remedies for disease prevention or treatment, confirming that these products were already a routine part of health maintenance for roughly three out of four adults surveyed. Yet when the same population was asked about remedies specifically aimed at COVID-19, the figures collapsed. Only 27.7 percent reported using natural products to prevent the disease, a mere 3.9 percent used them as treatment after infection, and 11.8 percent reported using them for both purposes combined.

This gap between general use and pandemic-specific use is one of the most intriguing aspects of the study. It suggests that the population did not wholesale abandon conventional public health guidance in favor of herbal alternatives, as some feared during the pandemic’s most chaotic months. Instead, the Emirati respondents appear to have largely maintained their pre-existing habits while relying on official prevention measures, vaccination campaigns, and medical care for COVID-19 itself. The authors suggest this separation between general wellness practices and acute disease management reflects a pragmatic approach to health decision-making.

Demographic analysis revealed that two factors significantly influenced whether individuals turned to natural remedies against COVID-19: sex and age. Women were more likely than men to use natural products for pandemic protection, a pattern consistent with broader literature showing that women tend to be the primary consumers of complementary and alternative medicine worldwide. Age also played a statistically significant role, with the association reaching p = 0.045, while the association with sex reached p = 0.011, both conventional thresholds of statistical significance. Other demographic variables did not show meaningful relationships with remedy use in this sample.

Perhaps most revealing were the perceptions surrounding efficacy. A substantial majority of participants expressed skepticism about natural remedies as pandemic tools. Fully 41.6 percent believed natural remedies had low efficacy in preventing COVID-19, and an even larger 52.9 percent considered them ineffective for treating the disease. In other words, half of the surveyed population regarded herbal and natural approaches as therapeutically weak against the virus itself, even while maintaining their general use of these products for everyday health purposes.

This perception gap between general wellness and acute antiviral protection is scientifically coherent. Many commonly used natural products, such as honey, ginger, garlic, lemon, and various herbal teas, have documented antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, or general immunomodulatory properties that may support overall health. However, none have demonstrated the ability to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection or to neutralize the virus once it has established itself in the respiratory tract. The respondents’ skepticism, therefore, appears to align with the available scientific evidence, even if it was likely shaped more by personal experience and public messaging than by clinical trial data.

One of the more concerning findings emerged when the researchers examined attitudes toward quarantine. Among participants who had a history of COVID-19 infection, 42.9 percent believed that using natural remedies made quarantine unnecessary, compared with 25.6 percent of those without such a history. This belief, that natural products could substitute for isolation protocols, represents a potential public health risk, as it could encourage infected individuals to continue social contact while relying on remedies that cannot stop viral transmission. The elevated rate among those who had experienced infection suggests that personal experience with the disease may have fostered overconfidence in alternative approaches, or that those who relied on remedies during illness rationalized their choices after the fact.

Interestingly, the study found no significant difference in perceived risk of COVID-19 between natural remedy users and non-users. This challenges a common hypothesis in the complementary medicine literature, which holds that people turn to natural remedies because they fear conventional medicine, distrust pharmaceutical interventions, or perceive the disease itself differently. In the UAE sample, the decision to use or avoid natural products during the pandemic appears to have been driven by other factors, possibly including cultural traditions, family practices, or simple habit, rather than differential risk perception.

The methodology of the study warrants careful consideration when interpreting these findings. The cross-sectional design captures a single moment in time and cannot establish causation. The social media distribution, while practical during lockdown conditions, may have introduced sampling bias toward younger, more digitally connected residents, potentially underrepresenting older adults who might hold different attitudes toward traditional medicine. The relatively modest sample size of 382 participants, while adequate for detecting the observed associations, limits the statistical power available for subgroup analyses. Additionally, the data collection window in early 2021 preceded widespread vaccine availability in many regions, meaning attitudes may have shifted substantially as vaccination campaigns accelerated later that year.

Nevertheless, the study fills an important geographic gap in the global literature on pandemic-era alternative medicine use. Much of the published research on natural remedies and COVID-19 has focused on North America, Europe, and East Asia, leaving the Gulf region comparatively understudied despite its rich traditions of herbal medicine rooted in Arabic and Islamic healing practices. The UAE, with its highly multicultural population comprising Emiratis and large expatriate communities from South Asia, the Middle East, and beyond, offers a particularly interesting setting for such research, as diverse cultural traditions of natural medicine coexist within a modern, well-resourced healthcare system.

The authors conclude that the frequency of natural remedy use for COVID-19 prevention or treatment was very low in the UAE, a finding they interpret with some concern. Rather than viewing low usage purely as a triumph of evidence-based public health messaging, the research team argues that community outreach and public health programs are needed to raise awareness about the potential role of natural remedies in supporting general health and well-being. This framing reflects a growing consensus in integrative medicine that natural products may have a legitimate supportive role in overall wellness, provided they are not positioned as substitutes for vaccination, isolation, or medical treatment.

That dual message, embracing natural remedies for wellness while firmly directing people toward conventional measures for acute infectious disease, captures the delicate balance that public health authorities worldwide have had to strike. On one hand, dismissing traditional and natural medicine entirely risks alienating populations for whom these practices carry deep cultural significance, potentially undermining trust in health institutions more broadly. On the other hand, tolerating claims that honey or herbs can replace proven interventions like vaccination and quarantine invites the kind of dangerous substitution behavior hinted at in the quarantine findings of this very study.

As the world moves into the post-pandemic era, studies like this one provide valuable baseline data for understanding how populations actually behaved during a once-in-a-century health crisis. The UAE findings paint a picture of a population that largely resisted pandemic-specific alternative medicine fads while maintaining its traditional wellness practices, and whose skepticism about herbal antivirals proved largely justified by subsequent scientific evidence. For public health planners preparing for future infectious disease emergencies, the lesson is clear: cultural health practices are resilient and should be respected and integrated where appropriate, but crystal-clear communication about the limits of natural remedies against acute viral infections remains essential to keeping communities safe.