DR. DEBO THOMPSON

My mission is to help people enjoy sound health – Debo Thompson

She was diagnosed of high-blood pressure at the age of 35, while she was Chief Secretary at the Nigerian Breweries, and advised to slow down on her activities.   She subsequently had to resign from her job in order to be able to pay more attention to her health.

Mrs. Debo Thompson, unwilling to succumb to the condition,  decided to discover a solution for herself by experimenting with natural medicines. Thus, she began several researches on natural medicines and after experimenting with herself, according to her, her high-blood pressure became a thing of the past.
Since then, Mrs.Thompson has remained an adherent of nature care, and has continued to research more and more on the subject. Today, she has several brands of herbal medicines to her credit, and will soon be officially launching two books on natural medicine at an event to mark her 70th birthday on 16th December in Lagos.
The event will also be used to launch her NGO, ‘Princess Maria Ifanike Thompson Foundation for Elderly Widows, Single Parents and Youths’.  Mrs.Thompson, a Lagosian, who was for over six years a Weekend Vanguard Columnist on natural medicine spoke with Vista Woman recently.
Her words:
Background
I attended the African Church Bethel School on Broad Street in Lagos. I also attended Marywood College which was known in those days  as Marywood Commercial College. After working for some years, I went to London for a course in Secretarial Studies.

Mrs. Debo Thompson, ...we are a herbal race

On my return, I returned to the  Nigerian Breweries where I worked before I went to London.
I believe in natural therapy and I have been an adherent of nature care since 1964/65 when I came across a book by Harry Benjamin titled, “Everybody’s Guide To Nature Care”. That book exposed me and my close family members and associates to nature care. It also made me understand how you can, by self-treatment, treat yourself of many ailments.
Later, in the early seventies when I had stopped having children, I started having some health issues. My blood pressure started rising too high to the extent that I could no longer cope with my job as a company secretary.  So, I resigned in 1975 when I wasn’t allowed to close at 2pm daily as advised by my European doctor.
So, from April in 1976,  I started my own personal business as a distributor for Beer, mainly West African Breweries Beer and then when my former boss at the Nigerian Breweries also personally started producing  Vita Malt, I also became one of the distributors. That was how I started my business life.
My journey into traditional medicine practice
My conviction in what nature care could do was when I went for an  X-Ray, and was told that I may have to do some surgeries because of the type of ailment that I had. I didn’t want to undergo any surgery actually.
So, one evening when I was in a hospital at Alaka in Lagos waiting to see a doctor, some other people who were in same situation as myself started lamenting over their situations, saying, “Is this how we will keep carrying our files until we die?”.
The person who said that didn’t know the message his words got through to me, but from that day, I resolved that my own case will be different. That was the beginning of my embracing nature care to the core. Having made that resolution, I decided to study natural medicine in 1984 or so. I carried out some researches, and by the time I put some herbs together and started using them, my high-blood pressure became a thing of the past.
I was looking older than the way I look now as at 1975, because I was really very sick. Funny enough, I was only  in my thirties at that time.
The wonders of nature care
All that nature cure has proved to me is too much for me to just  write in a book. Therefore, it is better for me to help other people enjoy sound health; that is my main objective now that I am clocking 70 years of age.  I am so passionate about this even to the extent that when I see somebody who is sick, the thought that emanates from me is how I could help even though I may not be close to that person.
There is nothing you can compare with nature; nature is everything. You can even regenerate a bad liver with nature care.
There are many herbs which nature has provided for us to help calm down our nerves. Take for instance Biophyllum Pinnatum which is known as Abamoda in Yoruba. If you chew 5 leaves of  it and  half a bulb of garlic twice a day which means one bulb of garlic, it will lower your blood pressure in ten days. This leaf  is  sold in the market by herbal dealers.
I also have it in my compound in abundance. When you take the 5 leaves and garlic morning and evening with a lot of water, you will be amazed at the result. In traditional medicine, we use it for many things.
Result of Africans’ failure to live naturally
Most of the health issues we suffer in Africa today are traceable to our failure to embrace nature care. We seem not to realize that traditionally, we are a herbal race. Otherwise, why do we have over 60,000 plants in Africa?
Why do Europeans come to tap from our reservoir of plants and to our own dismay here, research and make better use of  our own plants?  It is in our ignorant quest to live a totally western life that we all started eating butter and white bread for breakfast instead of our usual Ewedu and all.
In villages, you find people eating roasted yams with palm oil(no chemical) and maybe some ground dry pepper and salt, and you just cannot imagine the level of nutrient in that simple meal! That is eating naturally.
Instead of eating healthy foods these days, we now settle for meat pies, soft drinks, chemically processed fruit juices, etc. I tell you, if I were in a position of authority in Nigeria, I will orient people first on the reason why cancer is so much. The moment we all start living naturally, we will start hearing less of cancer related problems.
You see, creation always gives to you as much as you give to it. If you are in search of knowledge, you will just stumble on it. That was what actually happened to me with regards to traditional medicine, and that’s how I’ve been getting most of the knowledge I have on nature care. God has saved my life by helping me discover the good in traditional medicine, and that’s why  I am set to also give back to my society.’

By JOSEPHINE IGBINOVIA & PRECIOUS OKWUDI