Camel poop as “medicine” against diarrhea turns out to be a myth | medical

German soldiers are said to have successfully treated diarrhea with camel dung in Africa during World War II, according to stories. The soldiers had copied the remedy from the Bedouin, who would have taken the ‘medicine’ as fresh as possible for optimal results. But whether the desert dwellers actually did that or not, that it helped cannot be true, according to the researchers from Amsterdam UMC and the University of Amsterdam.

The bacteria Bacillus subtilis can be found in camel droppings. “There are indications that the bacterium Bacillus subtilis has a probiotic effect and can help with diarrhea. That makes the story that Bedouin used camel dung containing Bacillus subtilis to treat diarrhea attractive,” says microbiologist Jurgen Seppen. But there are simply far too few of those bacteria in camel droppings.

“We were only able to detect the bacterium using a very sensitive technique. This study showed that the concentration of Bacillus subtilis in camel dung is comparable to the concentration of this bacterium in human feces and in soil. Completely insufficient for a therapeutic effect.”

The method may not even have actually existed, says Seppen. With his colleagues, he not only examined the faeces, but also the literature. “There is a lot of literature on the therapeutic use of camel urine, but not on the use of camel poo.” The camel poo story can be traced back to a German website that has since been taken offline.

The scientists show with the results not only that “a good-sounding and ‘tasty’ nonsense story can be quickly adopted and disseminated, even in the serious scientific literature”.

Techniques have also been developed for camel droppings research that will be used to investigate the importance of Bacillus subtilis and other so-called spore-forming bacteria in intestinal diseases.