A combination of drugs hailed by U.S. President Donald Trump as an “extremely successful” Covid-19 treatment increases the chance of death among patients by 27 percent, a study has found.
Hydoxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug also being promoted by Brazilian President Jair Bolsanaro, does not affect coronavirus mortality rates, French scientists concluded. But when patients were treated with the drug as well as with the antibiotic azithromycin, which Mr. Trump had also recommended, the death rate increased by more than a quarter, the study found.
U.S. government virus expert Dr. Anthony Fauci has previously dismissed hydoxychloroquine as a possible treatment for coronavirus, but Mr. Trump has challenged his own public health officials to repeatedly defend its use.
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“Many doctors think it is extremely successful, the hydroxychloroquine in combination with the zinc and perhaps the azithromycin,” the president said.
But the researchers hope their meta-analysis, which included data from more than 33,600 patients, will put all questions about the effectiveness of hydoxychloroquine at rest.
“There are already a large number of studies that have evaluated hydroxychloroquine alone or in combination and it seems at this stage unlikely that any effectiveness will ever arise,” the study’s authors wrote in the journal Clinical microbiology and infection. “Our results suggest that there is no need for further studies evaluating these molecules.”
The researchers, including Thibault Fiolet of the Center for Research for Epidemiology and Population Health, evaluated 29 studies – processing the data of 11,932 patients treated with hydroxychloroquine, 8,081 who received hydroxychloroquine with azithromycin, and 12,930 in a control group which no one received,
Hydroxychloroquine is traditionally used to treat rheumatic diseases – those that affect parts of the body including joints, muscles and bones – while azithromycin is used when patients need its antiviral and anti-inflammatory properties.
Despite claims by world leaders, the authors said the analysis “shows that hydroxychloroquine alone is ineffective for the treatment of Covid-19 patients and that the combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin increases the risk of mortality”.
Previous studies have found that using both drugs together increases the chance of heart attack, and French researchers also concluded that such a course of medication “may increase the risk of acute, life-threatening cardiovascular events”.
Hydroxychloroquine was initially among drugs tested by the World Health Organization as a potential tool in the fight against Covid-19, however, the study was discontinued in July.
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