At his press conferences, the president offered hope that chloroquine would be a miracle cure. But experts explain how that was always a “lie.”
Since this article originally ran, doubts have mounted about the safety of chloroquine, with little evidence emerging that it is effective in treating COVID-19. Part of a Brazilian study on the effectiveness of chloroquine was stopped after some of its 81 subjects developed dangerous heart irregularities. Hydroxychloroquine, a derivative of chloroquine with similar pharmacological properties, also appears to be dangerous and lack efficacy.
At a press conference on Monday, he continued to gush over the drug and related a tale about a patient for whom it had a Lazarus-like effect. “They had given him the drug just a little while before, but he thought it was over. His family thought he was going to die. A number of hours later, he woke up, felt good.… He’s in good shape. And he’s very happy for this particular drug that we got approved in record-setting time. There’s never been anything even close to it.
Nor is there yet compelling evidence that chloroquine even works for COVID-19. Todaro and Rigano’s Google Doc mischaracterized the significance of the studies done to date, and Rigano’s claim to Tucker Carlson about its “100% cure rate” was simply false. The human trial he was referring to was a tiny preliminary study in which only 20 patients received chloroquine—far too minuscule a sample for conclusions to be drawn.
Those who would spread misinformation benefit from the fact that the public has long been poorly informed about how medicine and science work. Movies likecreate the impression that drugs that show initial promise are quite likely to be efficacious, and suggest that the public can effect positive change by lobbying for their use. But the reality is that most prospective drugs don’t hold up under investigation.
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