Does Hydroxychloroquine Really Cure Coronavirus?

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

The coronavirus pandemic is driving desperation to many who in search of a cure fall into the trap of false remedies and even dangerous substances that promise to be relief for their symptoms.

But of all of them one is monopolizing the attention: it is the hydroxychloroquine, a medicine that has been used for decades to treat lupus and malaria.

This drug emerged as an alleged promise to alleviate the respiratory illness caused by the COVID-19 virus after a week ago at a press conference in Washington, President Donald Trump praised its qualities, assuring that the drug "could have a very positive effect." Later, he reiterated his words through a tweet.

But the alarms have started to ring because this week there was a death in Arizona and a serious poisoning after a couple ingested chloroquine phosphate in their attempt to cure the symptoms of respiratory illness that they had not confirmed or not if they suffered from.

"The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not approved hydroxychloroquine (Plaquenil) for the treatment of coronavirus," explains the official site of the Lupus Foundation. "There have been stories in the news about hydroxychloroquine because the results of some small studies in China and Europe were initially promising. However, this drug is not currently recommended as a treatment for coronavirus at this time because there is insufficient evidence that it is effective. for this purpose".

For its part, the FDA itself indicates that "there is no vaccine or drug to prevent or cure COVID-19."

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A tweet from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warning of the differences between chloroquine phosphate, which is used to clean aquariums, and which some have mistaken for the drug to be used against COVID-19 and that this week caused a death in Arizona:

Likewise, Dr. Stephen Hahn, FDA commissioner, urged the public not to consume "any type of chloroquine" unless prescribed by their healthcare provider.

"Chloroquine phosphate is used in the maintenance of fish aquariums and is not the same FDA approved chloroquine that is being studied in the possible treatment of # COVID # 19," Hahn wrote in a tweet. "Do not take any type of chloroquine unless it is prescribed by a medical provider and obtained through legitimate channels."

"We want to warn our consumers that this product [is] used to treat parasites in fish aquariums and can have adverse [health] effects, including serious illness or death if taken by people"