Worried about COVID? Eat sauerkraut!

Forget about ventilators, masks, test kits and vaccines. During the height of the pandemic, Gov. Tim Walz’s Department of Health spent $19,700 on the real solution to COVID-19: sauerkraut!

Thanks to a grant from MDH, the Lower Phalen Creek Project produced a video called Traditional Ways of Health and Wellness: How to stay healthy during Covid-19 and beyond. The grant also funded “wellness bundles” full of herbal teas, dried sage, dried sweetgrass, and immunity-supporting lozenges.

In other words, MDF spent almost $20,000 during the pandemic on a video promoting home remedies while chastising others for COVID misinformation.

What’s in the video, you ask? The first speaker in this two-hour taxpayer-supported film advises Minnesotans to eat homemade sauerkraut to build up the lining of your gut because gut health is tied to immunity. They later promote fire cider as a “huge immunity booster” that provides “a lot of respiratory support” for COVID patients.

According to the grant agreement, the combined reach of the video was supposed to be 5,000 Minnesotans. The video currently has 17 views on YouTube, one of them from the Golden Turkey Committee.

Health Department Commissioner Jan Malcolm was probably relieved the video wasn’t seen by more than 17 people. Can you imagine hundreds of Minnesotans showing up in crowded emergency rooms after homemade sauerkraut remedies failed to treat their COVID symptoms?

Not to worry — the grant also funded the creation and distribution of 500 wellness bundles packed full of herbal teas, dried sage, dried sweetgrass, and immunity-supporting lozenges. The bundles included helpful instructions on how to use the contents to repel COVID.

To be fair, the grant agreement did require the distribution of more conventional COVID information about vaccines, testing, case interviews, contact tracing, and wraparound services, just to balance things out.

This grant is just one of many the Department of Health funded as part of their outreach to what they consider “underserved communities.” In this case, the state enlisted “respected community elders and knowledge keepers” to reach Native Americans. The Walz administration apparently assumes Native Americans and other minority groups don’t watch the news. It’s insulting. And expensive.

As such, the Minnesota Department of Health is nominated for a Golden Turkey for calling out COVID “misinformation” while simultaneously promoting sauerkraut and sage home remedies with taxpayer money.  


Should $20,000 to Promote Outrageous Home Remedies for COVID-19 take home this year’s Golden Turkey Award? Don’t forget to cast your vote!