No, this cucumber juice recipe won’t restore vision in 7 days

A video featuring an artificial intelligence-created physician is claiming that a homemade juice concoction of sliced cucumbers, carrots and garlic will "restore perfect vision in just seven days." 

The virtual physician, with a dubbed voice, explains in a Jan. 4 Facebook reel how to make what it calls "this miraculous drink" — by chopping and blending with water and fresh garlic carrots for beta carotene and cucumbers for vitamin B6, calcium and magnesium, he says.

"Pour yourself a glass and drink this preparation every morning on an empty stomach for seven days," the AI-generated doctor says before inviting viewers to subscribe to the account or sign up for a "free e-book."

This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

Although real eye doctors agree that a healthy diet can help people maintain good eyesight, this video’s claim that one drink can restore perfect vision in a week is nonsense.

Featured Fact-check

Threads posts

stated on October 26, 2024 in a Threads post

Four Florida counties had “zero results” Oct. 26, and “something underhanded might be happening.”

Experts at the National Eye Institute, which is a part of the National Institutes of Health, say that specific foods and supplements can sometimes improve vision for some patients, but the extent of this improvement and how it’s rendered are still being studied. There are a lot of qualifiers there. And, the group offer this big caveat:

"Unfortunately, no amounts of liver, carrots, or bilberries will give you owl-like night vision," an article on the Institute’s website says. (Bilberries are related to blueberries.)

If you wanted to try to improve or maintain your vision through nutrition, however, experts say cucumbers would not top the list of foods that are most beneficial. Carrots are more so — they are rich in beta carotene, a precursor to vitamin A, which helps your eyes adjust to dimness and keeps the eye’s surface, the cornea, moist and healthy. 

But there are many limitations to how and when an increase in beta carotene from carrots specifically can improve vision or prevent vision problems in patients, National Eye Institute investigator Dr. Emily Chew told Scientific American. 

"Most eye problems stem from vision-impairment caused by issues such as genetics, aging or diabetes that cannot be aided with an infusion of beta-carotene," Chew said.

We rate the claim that this  "miracle drink" can "restore perfect vision in seven days" False.