Two anti-malarial drugs Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine show early promising results in coronavirus treatment, U.S. doctors now say

As we reported yesterday night (New York Time), a new controlled clinical study conducted by doctors ​in France shows that Hydroxychloroquine is effective in the fight against coronavirus. The study, which was conducted by Didier Raoult​ M.D/Ph.D, et. al in France showed that 100% of patients that received a combination of HCQ and Azithromycin tested negative and were virologically cured within 6 days of treatment. Chloroquine and his sister drug, hydroxychloroquine, have been used to treat malaria since Word War II.

The study is part of the initiative from an independent group of scientists and physicians working on an open-data clinical trial for prevention of COVID-19, through the use of hydroxychloroquine in combination with other therapeutic agents. The group is now calling on President Trump to allow Americans to use the drug. However, the FDA said it’s not in a rush to approve the use of the drugs here in the United States due to lack of sufficient data.

However, FDA may be close to approving the use of the drugs for coronavirus patients here in the US as several laboratory studies now show chloroquine is effective at preventing as well as treating the virus that causes severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, a close cousin of COVID-19.

Late last night, White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx also confirmed that early laboratory research and anecdotal reports from using the drug in patients with COVID-19 have shown encouraging signs. “There are things that look really good in cell culture against the virus that may look good in small animals and then don’t have an impact in humans and so those are the pieces that we’re looking at very carefully,” she said at a press conference.

Given the effectiveness of chloroquine in treating SARS, scientists are investigating if it will be an effective treatment against the new coronavirus responsible for COVID-19. So far, the initial trials are encouraging.

“There is evidence that chloroquine is effective when they looked at SARS in vitro with primate cells,” said Dr. Len Horovitz, a pulmonologist and internist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. “The theory of the experiment with primate cells was that chloroquine could be for preventing viral infection or as a treatment for viral infection after it had occurred. In vitro in these primate cells, there was evidence that viral particles were significantly reduced when chloroquine was used.”

So far, the two drugs seem to show promising results in coronavirus treatment. Tesla CEO Elon Musk seems to think so, also.  “Maybe worth considering chloroquine for C19,” Musk said on Twitter.

Maybe worth considering chloroquine for C19 https://t.co/LEYob7Jofr

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 16, 2020