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A panel of experts convened on Tuesday by the US government’s top infectious disease agency. USA He recommended the use of a combination of an antimalarial drug and an antibiotic that President Donald Trump has touted as a possible “game changer” in the treatment of Covid-19.
The panel of experts said in the guidelines for treatment with Covid-19 that, except for the purposes of clinical trials, “it recommends against” the use of the antimalarial drug Hydroxychloroquine plus Azithromycin, the antibiotic, “because of the potential for toxicity.”
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But he left open the use of hydroxychloroquine or another version of it, chloroquine, by itself, saying that there is insufficient data to recommend for or against its use, but cautioned doctors that if they administered it, they should ” monitor the patient for adverse effect effect. “
Additionally, an analysis released Tuesday about the use of hydroxychloroquine to treat patients with coronavirus in US Veterans Affairs hospitals. USA It showed no benefits and caused more deaths. Researchers and experts have said that the study was not rigorous enough and that more data is required.
The panel of experts that issued the guidelines was convened by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a federal agency headed by Anthony Fauci, a member of President Trump’s White House task force on the coronavirus outbreak.
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Fauci had previously, and repeatedly, warned not to overestimate the benefits of the drug, or the combination, arguing that there was no proven evidence that it works against Covid-19. And he had been frank about it, making his case from the podium of the White House daily briefing by the task force with the president watching.
Fauci did not attend the briefing on Tuesday. When asked, Trump said he had not seen the guidelines.
The President has been an outspoken advocate of the antimalarial drug for himself and in combination with the antibiotic. “HYDROXYCHLOROKIN AND AZYTHROMYCIN, taken together, have a real shot at being one of the greatest game changers in the history of medicine,” he wrote in a tweet on March 21.
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The president pressed tweets and comments to journalists despite the public reaction of his experts. A key part of his argument was: “What do you have to lose?”. The drug, hydroxychloroquine, has been shown to be safe for decades to be prescribed to patients with malaria and even if it did not work in a Covid-19 patient it will not harm them.
The panel experts concluded that it can be harmful in combination with the antibiotic. On its own, the drug has been allowed for clinical trials, which are currently underway in patients with Covid-19 in New York, the epicenter of the U.S. outbreak that infected 824,438 people across the country and killed 45,052 on Tuesday. night.
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India lifted export restrictions on a bunch of drugs this month to allow a U.S.-ordered shipment of hydroxychloroquine at the urgent request of President Trump to Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this month. India is one of the largest drug manufacturers in the world and has deployed it for large-scale use as a prophylactic for healthcare workers.
The efficacy of hydroxychloroquine against the coronavirus has faced global scrutiny and has not fared very well. Hospitals in Sweden stopped using chloroquine earlier this month after reports of serious side effects, and researchers in Brazil aborted a trial after the death of patients who administered the drug.
