EAST AFRICAN STANDARD (Nairobi, Kenya) 06 May 05 ‘Doctor’ who uses chameleons to heal (Omwa Ombara)
Photo: Adhiambo administers the chameleon treatment on a patient.(Ajanga Khayesi)
When Nyeri residents collected 3,000 chameleons last week, the alleged buyer changed his colours and let them down.
Reports had circulated that a desperate exporter wanted them and would pay Sh1,900 for each. But in Nyanza, where the animals are used for the treatment of certain diseases, selling a chameleon would be unthinkable.
Had the Nyeri buyer arrived, he probably would have ended up selling the chameleons to importers in Belgium, Netherlands, Japan or Germany, where people spend as much Sh50,000 on one reptile (enough to buy five heifers or school fees for two years!).
Chameleons are often bought as birthday presents for women or kept as pets. Why are chameleons so expensive in Europe yet almost worthless in Kenya? In Europe and US, to say someone is "a chameleon" is to say the person is unreliable. But most people have not seen the animal that changes its colours to blend with different surroundings. They are extinct in most parts of the world, except in Africa.
William Karanja of Karen has tapped this unique market. He rears more than 500 chameleons and has exported 300 to Europe and Asia in the recent past. Chameleon breeders say one reptile can fetch as much Sh3,700 wholesale and Sh7,400 at retail prices.
In Nyanza, the chameleon is revered. It is used to treat hima, a Luo word for the swelling of the spleen, which mostly affects children.
Ruth Adhiambo, a traditional healer, was disgusted to learn that people were selling chameleons.
"I would not sell a chameleon for a million shillings. The lives of my patients come first," she says.
"Dr Adhiambo," as she is known, has been administering this specialised chameleon treatment for the last seven years. She hunts for chameleons from mango trees, bushes and maize farms. She charges a kilogram of sugar or Sh1,000 for her services. This depends on how she perceives her patients, most whom have tried conventional medicine and failed.
Adhiabo, 27, is a Standard Four dropout. Her clients vary from the illiterate poor to the educated and wealthy. Her most recent client, she says, was the child of a professor at a public university.
"The eight-year-old boy had suffered from hima for the last six years. His body was hot, eyes yellow, the hair falling off and his stomach was as hard as a rock. After the chameleon lick, the child recovered in two days," says Adhiambo.
Hunting for chameleons is no easy task, she says. So she sometimes asks the parents of the sick child to trap one and bring it to her.
"Chameleons are clever and camouflage themselves. It may take a year to trace one, but the effort is worthwhile, " she says.
Adhiambo is loath to explain how the treatment works. Holding a chameleon she has just captured, she reluctantly tells her "secret".
"I examine the child’s belly. After identifying the swollen spot, I take a razor and slice it. I let the blood flow to the ground, hold the chameleon with a stick and force it to open its mouth. Then I give it the blood to lick. Once it has licked the blood, I let it go. Two days later the child is absolutely healed."
What happens to the chameleon after it has licked infected blood? Does it die? Adhiambo has no answer. She does not do a follow-up on the "tool". That the treatment has been done is enough. The next patient will bring his own chameleon.
A Kisumu resident Christopher Ochola, 44, is full of praise for the treatment.
"My son died of hima at seven," he says.
"People told me that the chameleon treatment would have saved him. But I did not know about it then. It was so easy with my other child. I caught a chameleon at the foot of Got Nyahera and took to a healer in Kondele. The healing was instant!" he says.
Harrison Odoyo, 42, a supervisor at the Kenya National Museums, Kisumu, says the treatment is remarkable. He says his nephew suffered from hima and got treatment similar to Adhiambo’s.
"The hima healer sliced the wound with a razor and put the chameleon on the boy’s stomach to lick. He then took the chameleon’s saliva and rubbed it on the wound. In less than a week, the child recovered."
But Odoyo, who has worked at the museum for 20 years, says handling a chameleon is no easy task. It requires "extraordinary courage," thus the special respect for hima healers.
He says that chameleons in the museum are not given to hima healers but are fed to snakes.
"We get 300 chameleons from Khayega every month. They are there in plenty. There is no likelihood that they will run out because of the snakes or the hima healers," Odoyo says.
A chameleon has a gestation period of 10 months and is capable of delivering 15 to 35 neonates at a go.
There are many species of chameleons. For hima healers, it does not really matter —any chameleon will save a life.
‘Doctor’ who uses chameleons to heal