A Unesco World Heritage site in Poland is being used to help people recover from Covid-19, with patients going deep underground in the Wieliczka salt mine to a therapeutic centre dealing with respiratory illness.

Famous for its ornate underground chapels carved from salt, the Wieliczka mine, located just outside the southern city of Krakow, is one of Poland’s biggest tourist attractions, drawing around 1.8 million visitors in 2019.

But doctors say the micro-climate in the mine, which stretches as far as 327 metres underground, also helps people with pulmonary problems.

Magdalena Kostrzon, a doctor working at the mine, told Reuters that patients with respiratory illnesses have been coming there since the 19th century.