Miracle Cure? Briton Claims He Beat Coronavirus With Hot Toddy

One of the first Britons to have caught the dreaded novel coronavirus (nCoV) claimed that he was able to beat the illness using an “old-fashioned” remedy.

25-year-old Connor Reed thought that he only had a simple flu back in December. He was coughing and struggling to breathe, but was only after he was checked by doctors that he knew that he had already contracted the bug which has killed more than 360 people in China.

“I was stunned when the doctors told me I was suffering from the virus,” Reed told The Sun.

Reed, who has been living in China for the past three years, transferred to Wuhan – the birthplace of nCoV – last summer to teach English.

Even if he knew that the killer virus was in his system, Reed, who originally hails from Llandudno, North Wales, refused to take any remedy because he “didn't want to take any medicines.”

Instead, he decided to go old-school.

“I used the inhaler which helped control the cough and drank a hot whisky with honey until that ran out.

“It's an old fashioned remedy but it seemed to do the trick,” said Reed.

Reed drank a hot toddy, a simple concoction of liquor, honey, lemon and spices that is commonly known to relieve a person from cold or flu. Despite his claim, however, no study has yet proved that hot toddies can cure nCoV, according to Express UK.

In an effort to contain and find a cure for nCoV, China has initiated a clinical trial to test Remdesivir, a new antiviral drug made by Gilead Sciences, Inc. to combat other infectious diseases such as Ebola and SARS, a China-Japan Friendship Hospital told Bloomberg News.

As many as 270 patients with "mild and moderate pneumonia" will be recruited in a "randomized, double-blinded and placebo-controlled study," the outlet added, citing a report from The Paper.

While Reed can somewhat be the “poster boy” of someone who has survived nCoV, he can't say the same about Wuhan as he described the city to be a “ghost town” with barely enough supplies to provide for its quarantined residents.

“There is no medicine or masks left in the pharmacies. If you go out without a mask the police will arrest you,” he told The Sun.

Reed has decided to stay in Wuhan despite a “disinterested” Foreign Office offered him a seat on an evacuation flight to the United Kingdom.

“I'll stick it out here. I am proof coronavirus can be beaten,” expressed Reed.