‘Love spray’ key to warring communities

By Gatonye Gathura

Kenya: A nasal spray may be all it will take to kick-start the Nyumba Kumi initiative as well as create trust between perennial warring communities in the north.

The spray containing the chemical called ‘trust’ or the ‘love’ hormone and sold as Liquid Trust has been found to soften even the hardcore hatred between Israel-Jews and Palestinians.

Oxytocin, a hormone produced in the human brain and found to be responsible for social bonding that occurs between lovers, friends, and colleagues is now widely marketed online as a nasal spray.

A new study by the University of Haifa, Israel and University of Chicago, US, shows for the first time that people exposed to the hormone oxytocin are likely to love and even embrace not only their colleagues and partners but their enemies as well.

The researchers led by Ahmad Abu-Akel of the University of Haifa experimented on whether the love hormone would have any effect on the feelings of Israeli-Jews towards the pain and suffering of a Palestinian.

The team found the group which had been exposed to the hormone was much more sympathetic to the Palestinians compared to a group that had been exposed to a placebo only. The study is published in the current issue of the journal Psychoneuroendocrinology.

Peace negotiators

While the researchers do not suggest the two communities be exposed to the hormone en masse it suggests that peace negotiators on both sides should be trained on how to appreciate the perspectives of the opposing side.

It may not be long before marketers of the synthetic oxytocin and peace activists start to promote the hormone as the ultimate medicine for human conflict in Africa.

This thought is not farfetched, already marketers of Liquid Trust on their webpage: liquidformula.com say their product is much more than a love portion.