France Bans Hydroxychloroquine To Treat Covid-19
by Alex Ledsom
The French government has banned the prescription of hydroxychloroquine to treat symptoms of Covid-19 due to serious concerns over health risks. Many wonder if it’s the end of the road for the wonder drug, initially championed by France in March.
In March, hydroxychloroquine was touted as a wonder cure
The battle to use the drug in France has been waging for the past two months. In March, a French professor, Didier Raoult, based at the IHU, the Institute of Infectious Diseases in Marseille, published results suggesting he had been successfully treating patients with symptoms of Covid-19 with hydroxychloroquine. Raoult has been using the anti-malarial drug (also used to treat lupus sufferers) combined with an antibacterial drug, azithromycin, because of its antiviral effects.
The findings were widely condemned across the medical profession because the drug causes heart irregularities, leading many to believe that doctors might prescribe it to patients without due care, leading to far worse health problems. Critics claimed that the study simply showed anecdotal evidence–for example, the study only contained a small sample size and it lacked a control group, so many of the patients may have simply improved without taking the drug.
In March/April, hydroxychloroquine was increasingly prescribed
Regardless, the study found supporters in President Trump, who tweeted his support for hydroxychloroquine, stockpiled 29 million doses and announced that he was himself taking the drug. A high profile visit by President Emmanuel Macron to visit Raoult in Marseille suggested the government was taking it seriously and the drug was included in many trials around the world.
In France, a study of the 466 million prescriptions written in France since the pandemic began, showed a spike of 7,000%. Normally, 50 prescriptions are written for hydroxychloroquine in Marseille every day, but by the last week in March, 10,000 people had been given the drug that week alone. Across France, 5,000 prescriptions were written for the drug in just one day.
In May, a negative turn for hydroxychloroquine
By the end of May, a Lancet observational study (not a clinical trial) of 15,000 patients treated with hydroxychloroquine between December and April suggested that not only was the death rate higher for people taking the drug, but that heart rhythm problems are more than five times greater. Professor Raoult denounced the Lancet study as “bogus”.
The European Medicines Agency warned that not only was there no conclusive evidence that the drug worked, but that it also caused fatal heart problems in some patients. Such safety concerns over the drug duly prompted the WHO to suspend current trials.
The French health minister Olivier Véran asked the French High Council for Public Health (HCSP) to look into the drug to see if any recommendations should be changed.
After they reported that the drug shouldn’t be given, except in clinical trials, the French government revoked the right for hospitals to use hydroxychloroquine, even to patients who were gravely ill.
Le Monde announced Wednesday that the The Medicines Agency (ANSM) had also "initiated" the procedure to suspend clinical trials “as a precaution” which evaluated the role of hydroxychloroquine in patients with Covid-19.