In March 2020, during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, a man known as Dr. Dan Lee Dimke talked about what he describes as the "Achilles heel of the coronavirus" on a viral YouTube video. He cited scientific studies and claimed that ending the virus is easy and it only requires a few days of 20-minute sessions in a sauna.
Can saunas kill coronavirus?
Dr. Dan Lee Dimke said that if you do not have a sauna, you can simply spray water on your face and aim the hot air from a blow dryer up your nose for 5 minutes twice a day. The hot temperature is said to kill viruses and the health benefits of saunas can also boost your immune system, which is what you need to combat COVID-19.
However, not everyone is convinced about this advice. Dr. Katrina Armstrong, physician-in-chief of Massachusetts General Hospital stated that there is no information to suggest that saunas and hot temperatures can kill the coronavirus. She stated that the assertions do not make any medical sense.
Armstrong called Dr. Dimke's advice incorrect and dangerous, as people should be self-isolating and not going into tight spaces in public areas. She said that there are no data to support those claims and there are no randomized and controlled trials done regarding sauna use and there is no reasonable scientist who would suggest that. There is also no evidence that suggests attacking the sinuses with hand-held hair-dryer could kill the virus.
As for the question about hot temperatures killing the virus, Dr. Armstrong stated that it is not a universal rule that warmer temperatures kill all viruses, and it is just another misleading social media post claims. There are some viruses such as the annual flu and the Spanish flu in the 1910s that did strike harder during the winter months and declined when during the summer months. It is a pattern that is not entirely understood by the medical community.
Dr. Armstrong added that viruses differ in all things, and that is why there is so much effort being put into understanding the transmission. Experts are not trying to understand why warmer months affect the transmission.
Spread of misinformation
Several public officials, including Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts and Mayor Joseph Petty of Worcester, have urged people to get their news from reputable sources and to avoid rumors. Bakers said during a press conference on April 12 that everyone needs to get their news from legitimate places and not from their random people.
Federal and state authorities have also warned about an increased number of scams targeting those seeking products that claim to help combat the disease. But a vaccine preventing the virus does not currently exist, and there is no medicine recommended to prevent or treat infection, according to the World Health Organization or WHO.
Both the WHO and the CDC started addressing myths surrounding COVID-19 earlier this year when the virus first started to spread around the world. Since then, misinformation about the virus has grown and false advice has spread online.
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