Former U.S. President Donald Trump became the butt of jokes about a year ago by saying, “Disinfectants and ultraviolet or just a very powerful light could be used to treat coronavirus patients.”

The real estate tycoon-turned-politician could be forgiven for confusing killing viruses on the petri dish with destroying them in the human body.

However, it is a different story if one of the so-called experts makes a similar assertion for dubious purposes.

On Tuesday, Park Jong-soo, director of Antiviral Immunology Research Institute of Namyang Dairy Product, said Bulgaris, the company's bottled yogurt product, could reduce the Covid-19 virus by 77.8 percent in experiments using monkeys’ lung cells as host cells.

“Considering that people drink the product through oral passages, I think it will have the effect of reducing and inhibiting the Covid-19 virus,” Park said at a workshop held by the Korea Research Institute of Biomedical Science.

Namyang later handed out separate news releases, touting that it was the first study in Korea to prove that fermented milk products are effective against the coronavirus.

If Namyang's statement is true, the government is going about containing the virus all wrong. It should not be struggling to secure expensive vaccines but handing out the bottled yogurt to citizens as a cheaper and more efficient way to contain the Covid-19 outbreak. A bottle of Bulgaris is below 1,000 won ($0.89),

However, when looking at the specific experimental method of how Namyang came to make such a ludicrous statement, it was obvious how weak the basis for their claim was.

After Park’s presentation, a Namyang researcher reenacted the experiment by placing the corona-infected cells in a petri dish containing Bulgaris and then measured the virus's reduction rate.

If such a test method was acceptable for measuring the virus reduction rate, numerous other ways might have shown better results in virus reduction.

As the World Health Organization has numerously said that hand sanitizer alcohol effectively killed Covid-19 viruses and advised people to rub their hands with the product as much as possible, hard liquor distillers could use the same method and place the corona-infected cells in high alcoholic beverages, such as whiskey or vodka, and claim that their drink reduced the virus rate successfully.

As expected, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said a few hours later that the Bulgaris experiment resulted from soaking the virus into the product itself. Therefore, it is difficult to predict whether it will be effective for humans.

As controversy broke out, Namyang tried to wiggle out of the situation by stating that the company was not the host of the symposium and that the lecture was just an announcement of the results of a simple study, but that it got out of hand “after reporters participating in the seminar reported on the issue.”

Namyang Dairy's stock price surged to the price limit at one time in after-hours trading after the report on Tuesday, while the product went out of stock at supermarkets and online malls. Some convenience stores had to limit the number of purchases to one bottle per person. Bulgaris’ sales increased by 75 percent compared to the previous day at convenience stores.

The public's anger toward the company continued to grow. Some pointed out that the company's laboratory study results have violated research ethics.

A company can advertise its product, but it is responsible for correcting any inaccurate information and unintended results that have caused controversy in the market.

Stock investors who bought up 6.13 billion won ($5.48 million) worth of Namyang Dairy stocks for two days call for investigating into possible stock manipulation. Industry watchers expect a right move on the part of the financial regulator or law enforcement authorities, stressing that it is unethical to resort to shallow business gimmicks that capitalize on the public’s Covid-19 fears.