Bihar govt encourages people to install indoor plants for fresh oxygen

In an attempt to help those worried about oxygen scarcity amid the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic, the Bihar government on Friday launched a campaign to encourage installation of oxygen-giving indoor plants.

Department of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Bihar launched the campaign '#NatureCuresYou' to sensitise people about how nature can help beat coronavirus.

"In these exceptional times, when there is an enormous scarcity of oxygen, knowledge about indoor oxygen-giving plants and other therapeutic spices and herbs will provide needful support to distressed people.

"Through this campaign, the department intends to sensitize people about the infinite ways by which nature can help us beat this lethal infection," the department said in an official statement.

Dipak Kumar Singh, Principal Secretary, Department of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Bihar, was quoted as saying, "Our goal is to improve people's health by making them aware about indoor plants which give us oxygen and about other plants, herbs, and spices, which have medicinal value, through #NatureCuresYou campaign."

He said that such an information will help people get cured of common ailments at home with easy, natural treatment.

The department said that plants and nature have been the base of ancient Ayurvedic science and their use in the domestic treatment of common diseases continues to date.

"Thus, the campaign #NatureCuresYou is to highlight such effective methods of simple treatment, by which the common people can take care of their health, while being at home and minimal external intervention," it said.

It suggested that people should keep at home plants of medicinal values such as Giloy, Kalimirch and Pippali (long pepper) which can boost immunity and help cure many common diseases.

Snake Plant, Rubber plant, Areca Palm are some of the indoor oxygen-providing plants and they are instrumental in the creation of a healthy indoor environment, it said.

"The pandemic has confined people to their homes, and therefore the need of a purified and oxygenated atmosphere has become a necessity. This campaign encourages people towards indoor and potted plants, which can be an invaluable source to purified fresh oxygen, at no extra cost," it said.