Posted on 04/10/2020 10:54:51 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
The drug doesn't come without a certain set of risks, and no one knows if it can effectively treat COVID-19.
The president and some of his close advisors — desperate for a COVID-19 cure — are asking “What do you have to lose?” by taking hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), a strong medication never adequately tested for efficacy or safety in COVID-19 patients. The correct answer to the president’s question, which he doesn’t seem to want to hear, is that we have our lives to lose.
The president acknowledges “I’m not a doctor” but this raises the question “What do doctors know about the drug recommended by the president?" Most doctors are aware that HCQ can be effective for patients with malaria, arthritis or lupus. If they were to follow the president’s suggestion and prescribe it for COVID-19 patients, they would also like to know that it will benefit some of those patients, at least.
This drug hasn't proven to be successful in treating viral illnesses
What is known? HCQ has been tested previously in several viral illnesses but never found effective. Importantly, there is no evidence whatsoever that HCQ can prevent COVID-19, and there is only anecdotal evidence that it improves the course of the disease. The reports that it can reduce the measurable levels of the virus in patients are seriously flawed, lack a valid control group and were released to the public with little, if any, scientific review. Proper clinical trials with HCQ are underway, but these will take months. In summary, doctors do not know if HCQ or any other drug now being tested is effective or will have any medical benefit.
Without any assurance of benefit, what do you have to lose? Most doctors rely on the FDA-approved label to evaluate the “risk” side of the benefit/risk equation for each presciption. The drug label for HCQ, and its close relative Chloroquine, are very clear about their risks and both contain a page and a half of stark warnings that include the possibility of blindness due to retinal injury, loss of consciousness due to low blood sugar, suicidal behavior, heart failure, potentially lethal interactions with other drugs, lethal heart rhythm disturbances and yes, death. When doctors prescribe HCQ, they expect that the risk of these potentially tragic side effects will be outweighed by some benefit.
Doctors are also trained to use their medical skills to evaluate the patient’s overall condition as part of the risk/benefit equation for a drug and to take appropriate measures to mitigate any risks. They know that some patients are at greater risk of developing side effects than others. Unfortunately, the patients at greatest risk for most of HCQ’s serious side effects are the same as the very sickest COVID-19 patients, e.g. those on respirators with low blood oxygen levels and with disturbances in body chemistry.
Continuous ECG monitoring is one of the methods used to prevent potentially lethal cardiac effects of HCQ and chloroquine. In many ICUs, computerized decision support systems monitor the patient’s electronic chart and send advisories to physicians when a drug’s risk exceeds safe thresholds. However, these surveillance tools are not generally available outside of the hospital and could not protect those who might try to prevent COVID-19 by taking HCQ.
Special exceptions are made for emergencies
Pandemics and other public health tragedies alter the usual norms and requirements of medical practice. When a life is in danger, physicians may decide to prescribe an unproven drug and monitor the patient for any potentially serious side effects. To enable such use, the FDA has “approved” the careful use of HCQ under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). It should be emphasized that the FDA did not approve HCQ as either safe or effective to treat or prevent COVID-19. Recognizing the unique situation doctors are facing, the FDA’s emergency authorization is for the “unapproved use of hydroxychloroquine” supplied from the nation’s stockpile but only for hospitalized adults and adolescents “for whom a clinical trial is not available, or participation is not feasible”.
The FDA’s EUA Fact Sheet should be carefully read by anyone contemplating prescribing or taking HCQ. Also, the public should know that the FDA is working hard to correct a problem at some public websites that post drug labels. Labels for 15 of the 49 products containing HCQ are out of date and do not contain the warnings found in the currently approved HCQ label or in the FDA’s Fact sheet.
In this crisis, our political leaders are grasping at straws and encouraging hope. When faced with a national medical crisis such as a pandemic, I encourage our leaders to defer to the medical and scientific experts who have the knowledge, skills and training to save lives and to not encourage unnecessary or unfounded risks with our lives and our safety.
Dr. Raymond L. Woosley is a professor of medicine at The University of Arizona, College of Medicine-Phoenix. He is the president of the Arizona Center for Education and Research on Therapeutics.
They always mention heart and eyes to make people afraid.
I wouldn’t really mind losing a bit of peripheral vision. I wouldn’t even bother to hire a bodyguard.
This quack is suffering from a really bad case of TDS for which there in fact, is no treatment.
Anything to keep the fear going and the economy shut down.
The virus is a real threat, but does anyone seriously doubt that the real purpose/target is getting Trump removed from office.
Since this crisis started right after impeachment failed it makes you really wonder what is going on.
Or maybe Schiff wasn’t kidding when he told senators their head would be on a pike if they didn’t remove Trump from office.
Yup, it’s a somewhat safer form, but even that form was generally harmless.
You get a dose of 83 mg of quinine from a liter of tonic water.
I was prescribed it when I took a business trip to India. No side effects and I am still alive. The doc didn’t mention that I might die from it. Maybe because the risk was nil.
And besides that, it is a F-ING LIE!!!!
First, the drug is not that dangerous in general; it is not just used to treat malaria, it is given to prevent malaria, and most people who have traveled to a country with malaria have taken it.
Second, yes, we need to check if the drug has a bad interaction when taken while you have COVID, but we have not heard of a single study or case where there was such a reaction, so by now I think it seems rather unlikely, except in rare instances.
Third, given that millions of pills have been snapped up and used by this point, I think doctors on the front line have a pretty good feeling about whether it is helping or not, even though we will want actual studies.
ANd given that I have NOT read of a hospital telling us that they stopped using it because it wasn’t helping, I’m guessing that doctors are at least THINKING it is helpful.
Then we have the models, that “look wrong” because things are getting better quicker — which is exactly what I would expect if the models were based on ‘non-HCQ’ treatment, and now we were doing a lot of HCQ treatment and it was curing some people who might die, and reducing the number of days in hospital.
So yes, we don’t “know” — but i would think by now we would know if it was a bust. I am also thinking it isn’t as great as we would like, or we’d also know more, so it probably is “helping”, and we could use a drug that worked better. Just my opinion.
Are you or a loved one of the many thousands of people that have been cured of the ChiCom Flu with Hydroxychloroquine?
Well, the Democraps of America would like you to get back on your deathbed and shut up.
Orange Man Bad.
They should be asked what it even means to have a prolongated QT cycle - and the exact risk factor for those taking hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin. It's minute.
You have the same to lose as those who have been taking it for malaria for decades, or for lupus.
The closest I can come to a double blind test is I work in an essential business, while my wife works from home. Neither one of us has been sick. The whole social distancing thing is out the window this week anyway because of people buying Easter stuff.
Church mission trips to Guatemala include this drug in the pre-trip checklist.
And not taking it you risk your life.
Thirty years ago, many doctors would sanctimoniously tell you that sprinkling a little salt n your food would be fatal, too. Those fools have melted back into the woodwork, along with the fools who said not to eat food that had cholesterol in it.
Just having an MD degree is no guarantee of being completely foolish.
>>In 2005, he founded Critical Path Institute (C-Path), an independent, non-profit organization created jointly by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the University of Arizona to help implement the FDA’s Critical Path Initiative and accelerate the development of new drugs and diagnostics.
So he’s part of the system, helped create the system, that makes it a multi-year process to get a new drug FDA approved, and is very invested in that process. No wonder he doesn’t like off-label use of an existing drug the side effects of which are well-understood.
If it was found that this could mitigate the effects of STDs, I’ll bet you wouldn’t see such absurd opposition from them.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but PDJT has not prescribed a single dose of this medication. I believe the treating physician is still making all the decisions for his patients. Or did I miss something.
#STOP THE HATE!
I took it before going to India. My doctor didn’t mention any risks, he just prescribed it for me and my wife.
This — and many other incidents throughout the media — is irresponsible and can not only create unneeded fear, but real deaths.
This is how the whole vaccines-cause-autism thing got started, and now folks won’t vaccinate even for things they should vaccinate for.
Disgusting...
Hydroxychoroquine prevents the virus from destroying the red blood cells ability to transport oxygen.
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