The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced that they have temporarily suspended studying hydroxychloroquine as a potential coronavirus treatment siting “safety concerns.” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the announcement during a press conference on Monday.
The decision was made following a study published in the the Lancet medical journal. The study described how seriously ill coronavirus patients that were treated with hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine had a greater chance of dying.
A clinical trial of malaria drug hydroxychloroquine in COVID-19 patients has been suspended amid safety concerns, @WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said https://t.co/48KQNnx2vw pic.twitter.com/xSdrhiMUrl
— Reuters (@Reuters) May 26, 2020
However Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, the medical professional behind America’s push to use hydroxychloroquine, explains that the drug isn’t meant to be used on seriously ill patients but rather during the initial stages of the infection. Dr. Zelenko has boasted that hydroxychloroquine combined with Z-pac (azithromycin) has successfully cured hundreds of corona patients in his Hasidic town of Kiryas Joel in Monroe, NY.
Tedros claimed that an independent executive group is currently reviewing hydroxychloroquine’s usage in the WHO’s Solidarity Trial. The group involves 10 representatives of the participating countries in the trial.
“The review will consider data collected so far in the Solidarity Trial and, in particular robust randomized available data, to adequately evaluate the potential benefits and harms from this drug,” Tedros explained. “The Executive Group has implemented a temporary pause of the hydroxychloroquine arm within the Solidarity Trial while the data is reviewed by the Data Safety Monitoring Board.”
Patients from over 400 hospitals in 35 countries are being recruited as a global research effort to find safe and effective treatments for coronavirus.
“This concern relates to the use of hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine in Covid-19,” he said. “I wish to reiterate that these drugs are accepted as generally safe for use in patients with autoimmune diseases or malaria.”