Hydroxychloroquine, The ‘Game Changer’ Drug Trump Promoted Doesn’t Work On Serious COVID-19 Cases

For decades, hydroxychloroquine has been a widely used drug to treat malaria, lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis but when the U.S. became the hotspot for the coronavirus pandemic last month, it became President trump’s advertising tool.

Calling it a “game-changer” and touting how “great" it will be, he made the drug sound harmless. But as per recent preliminary results from a large study of hydroxychloroquine has barely any effect in serious COVID-19 cases.

Trump has promoted the drug saying it showed "tremendous promise" against COVID-19, even claimed that the drug can "help them, it's not going to hurt them" and that he was planning to take it himself. But the fact is that not only is the drug of not much use in combating coronavirus it also may have potentially deadly side effects, including heart-related risks.

As per the study, it has been found that the drug "didn't really have much of an effect on the recovery rate," as shared by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo during CNN’s coronavirus town hall.

"I think from the review that I heard basically it was not seen as a positive, not seen as a negative," Cuomo said.

The New York State Department of Health sponsored the above-mentioned study which observed 600 patients at 22 hospitals in the greater New York City area, dividing them into test groups who had taken hydroxychloroquine, with or without the antibiotic azithromycin.

"We don't see a statistically significant difference between patients who took the drugs and those who did not," said David Holtgrave, dean of the University at Albany School of Public Health, who conducted the study.

Holtgrave shared that the pure intention of conducting the study was not to halt the usage of hydroxychloroquine but update the general knowledge about its usefulness against coronavirus and to be cautious with its usage going forward.

"Hopefully what we've done here is to start collecting data and evidence and learning lessons as we go forward about effects and side effects," Holtgrave said. He added that the final results of his research, regarding whether the administration of the drugs has any effect on a patient being admitted to an ICU, will be released by next week.