Human Challenge Trials and Hydroxychloroquine; Should we deliberately infect volunteers with COVID-19 to expedite the development of a vaccine?

Stage III vaccine testing is being done by administrating the vaccine or a placebo to around 30,000 people. Then the number taking the vaccine or the placebo who develop COVID-19 are counted. If the vaccine is good, statistically, fewer in the vaccine group will catch the disease compared to the placebo group. If too few people in the trial catch the disease, the numbers will be too small to come to a statistically strong conclusion. It may take a long time for enough cases to accumulate. A lot of time will be wasted on extensive paperwork designed to ward off lawyers trying to profit from others' misery.

A human challenge trial is a much simpler and faster method of testing a vaccine. Volunteers are infected deliberately with live virus after having been vaccinated. A placebo group, vaccinated with fake vaccine, is also infected to make sure that the infection works and perhaps answer other questions such as whether many people are innately immune to the virus. Within a week or two after the infection is made, it will become obvious if the vaccine is working.

Younger, healthy adults are not likely to suffer or die from the virus. A much smaller number of people are needed in human challenge trials because exposure to the virus is assured, rather than waiting around until enough of the cohort catch it from the environment.

The participants in the trial would of course be volunteers, and probably they would be paid, but nothing exorbitant. They would have one clear benefit, after the trail is over, they would be immune, either from catching the virus or because the vaccine works.

There is a strong case that hydroxychloroquine combined with zinc and azithromycin, given early in the course of the disease, makes the disease much milder. Hydroxychloroquine is a safe drug used for over 50 years. The theory behind this is that the HCQ makes it easier for zinc to pass into cells. Zinc inhibits the reproduction of the virus. Slowing down the multiplication of the virus gives the patient's immune system more time to develop immunity before the virus overwhelms the patient, making him very sick or even killing him. The HCQ treatment must be given early. It is not useful for patients who are already deathly sick.

Quite a few doctors and scientists have advocated the use of HCQ based on clinical experiences and . Recently, Dr. Harvey A. Risch, a professor of epidemiology and a medical doctor at Yale, wrote a review paper. He even published an op-ed in Newsweek.

Dr. Risch is eminently qualified to write about HCQ. The reaction to his articles was virulent hatred and an apparent attempt to get him fired. Supporting Trump by promoting a treatment suggested by Trump is an unforgivable sin among Trump-hating academics. The science does not matter, only the politics. The dean of the Yale School of Public Health felt it necessary to write that it is not his job to suppress the opinions of academics working at this school. A letter signed by 21 Yale academics denounced Dr. Risch.

In his Newsweek editorial, Dr. Risch states: "I myself know of two doctors who have saved the lives of hundreds of patients with these medications but are now fighting state medical boards to save their licenses and reputations. The cases against them are completely without scientific merit."

In my own state of Nevada, the governor has outlawed HCQ except for hospitalized patients. By the time the patient is hospitalized, it is too late. Maybe a new approach to finding a workable vaccine will make a difference.

“I’m curious as to whether people who take Hydroxy for something else have contracted the disease.”

That’s been asked a lot, and ignored.

Many people use it for arthritis and lupus, and in countries with malaria it’s used a lot.

Anyone seen a study on those folks’ case rates and outcomes?

Any links?

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