Before an existing medicine can be used to treat a different ailment you need FDA approval. In the case of hydroxychloroquine - it needed Emergency Use Authorization. For example, you can't just take an existing sinus medicine and magically claim it now treats liver cancer. You need FDA approval based on the submission of appropriate data & clinical trials to be allowed to use an existing medicine for a new purpose. When hydroxychloroquine was proposed to be used for COVID-19; it needed FDA Emergency Use Authorization to allow doctors to prescribe it for this purpose. An existing drug has several advantages in the approval process for a new purpose. The interactions, side-effects, and other information is already known from previous trials. THE FDA Emergency Use Authorization for using hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19 can be found here - https://www.fda.gov/media/136534/download
Here is an interesting study wrt to Chloroquine and SARS-CoV. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1232869/ Chloroquine is a potent inhibitor of SARS coronavirus infection and spread Results We report, however, that chloroquine has strong antiviral effects on SARS-CoV infection of primate cells. These inhibitory effects are observed when the cells are treated with the drug either before or after exposure to the virus, suggesting both prophylactic and therapeutic advantage. In addition to the well-known functions of chloroquine such as elevations of endosomal pH, the drug appears to interfere with terminal glycosylation of the cellular receptor, angiotensin-converting enzyme 2. This may negatively influence the virus-receptor binding and abrogate the infection, with further ramifications by the elevation of vesicular pH, resulting in the inhibition of infection and spread of SARS CoV at clinically admissible concentrations. Conclusion Chloroquine is effective in preventing the spread of SARS CoV in cell culture. Favorable inhibition of virus spread was observed when the cells were either treated with chloroquine prior to or after SARS CoV infection. In addition, the indirect immunofluorescence assay described herein represents a simple and rapid method for screening SARS-CoV antiviral compounds.
Here is another observational study. Hopefully, a double-blind study will come out soon for HCQ. https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202005.0057/v1 Early hydroxychloroquine is associated with an increase of survival in COVID-19 patients: an observational study. Results: We analysed first 220 medical records. 166 patients met the inclusion criteria. 48,8 % of patients not treated with HCQ died, 22% of those treated with hydroxychloroquine (p=0,002). According to clinical picture at admission, hydroxychloroquine increased the mean cumulative survival in all groups from 1,4 to 1,8 times. This difference was statistically significant in the mild group. Conclusions: in a cohort of 166 patients from 18 to 85 years hospitalised with COVID-19, hydroxychloroquine treatment with 800mg added loading dose increased survival when patients were admitted in early stages of the disease. There was a non-statistically significant trend towards survival in all groups, which will have to be clarified in subsequent studies.
Variolation... ever heard of it? I hadn't before today. https://www.americanthinker.com/blo...e_answer_to_getting_america_back_to_work.html "Variolation worked by introducing a minute dose of the smallpox virus into the human body to trigger a mild infection that stimulates the immune system. Unfortunately, some people reacted strongly even to a small dose, and about 2% of people died. The variolation mortality rate, though, was still better than having smallpox running rampant through a community. With variolation, smallpox’s mortality ranged from 35% in Europeans to 90% in Native Americans." George Washington apparently had the entire Continental Army variolated when the British brought infected soldiers into Boston and started deliberately infecting surrounding rural areas with them. Germ warfare.
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/na...s/news-story/25a686904b67bdedbdcd544b1cab7f96 Coronavirus Australia: suicide’s toll far higher than virus Regions hard-hit by a collapse in tourism are expected to be particularly vulnerable to an increase in suicide. EXCLUSIVE SIMON BENSON NATIONAL AFFAIRS EDITOR 7:06AM MAY 7, 2020 Suicide rates in Australia are forecast to rise by up to 50 per cent due to the economic and social impacts of the coronavirus and tipped to outstrip deaths from the pandemic by up to 10 times. World-leading research by the country’s top mental health experts predicts the impact of the virus could result in an extra 1500 deaths a year over the next five years and a generational mental health crisis linked directly to the pandemic. The modelling, conducted by Sydney University’s Brain and Mind Centre and backed by the Australian Medical Association, is expected to be taken to national cabinet next week by Health Minister Greg Hunt ahead of an accelerated second-phase mental health package. R The modelling also predicts a significant economic blow from falling productivity due to the mental health effects of unemployment, school dropouts and family crises. Regions hard-hit by a collapse in tourism are expected to be particularly vulnerable to an increase in suicide and it is feared that young people are among those most at risk. Former mental health commissioner and the head of the Brain and Mind Centre, Ian Hickie, told The Australian that the modelling showed the annual rate of suicide could rise from 3000 to up to 4500, with youth suicides making up almost half. A joint statement will be issued today by Professor Hickie, AMA president Tony Bartone and Orygen youth mental health organisation executive director Patrick McGorry, calling for urgent action to address an issue which they claim will kill more people than the virus. Preliminary modelling by the Brain and Mind Centre suggests the COVID-19 pandemic may give rise to 25 per cent more suicides, with up to 30 per cent of those among young people aged 15-25 years. This was based on an unemployment rate of 10 per cent and the associated recessionary impacts. But this could rise to 50 per cent if unemployment was to peak at 15 per cent. The modelling shows hotspots in regional areas, including the Grafton and Northern Rivers regions of NSW, which have been severely hit by loss of tourism and hospitality as well as outer-metropolitan areas of Sydney and Melbourne. “We are facing a situation where between an extra 750 and 1500 suicides may occur annually, this in addition to the 3000-plus lives that are lost to suicide already every year,” Professor Hickie said. Source - World Health Organization, Australian Government, AAP, Reuters, Johns Hopkins, other media Mr Hunt confirmed last night that he had been briefed on the research and it was now being considered in the formulation of a new COVID-19 mental health package, which had been due to be taken to national cabinet on Friday but has been delayed until next week. “This is important and sobering work, which we welcome,” Mr Hunt told The Australian. “We know definitively from earlier economic crises that they increase mental health issues and the potential to increase suicide. Now we have modelling. “That’s why we are determined to be ahead of the curve with a three-part strategy. “Now the most important part of the recovery is helping as many people return to work as soon as possible. “It won’t just help the economy, and more importantly it will save lives and protect lives by reducing anxiety and mental health problems that come with deep economic impacts.” Professor Hickie told The Australian that the modelling on suicide had been presented to the government prior to COVID-19 but had been remodelled to include the suicide impacts of the pandemic using real-time data. “What happens in recessions, and we know this from the 2009 GFC, the Asian financial crisis and the Great Depression, is that suicide rates go up dramatically in recession … and they hurt the young the most … we can watch it and see it happening … or we can get ahead of the curve,” Professor Hickie said. “The impacts of unemployment will be greatest among the young, those who live in rural and regional Australia, and those areas hardest-hit by job losses will not recover quickly. “As restrictions on physical distancing and isolation are eased, Australia’s mental health system, already poorly designed and seriously under-resourced, must urgently be equipped with the capacity to respond to the expected influx in demand for services.’’ Professor McGorry, the executive director of Orygen and professor of youth mental health at the University of Melbourne, said there was a risk that a “second wave” of mental health issues would overwhelm the coronavirus response. “Scientific and clinical expertise is equally crucial to power and guide Australia’s response to the second curve of mental illness and suicide,” Professor McGorry told The Australian. “The new national mental health plan now urgently needs concrete and dynamic responses to flatten the curve. “It is reassuring to see the obvious commitment of the Prime Minister and Minister Hunt to flattening the second curve, which shapes to overshadow the first one.” Associate Professor Jo Atkinson, head of the Brain and Mind Centre’s systems modelling & simulation group, said: “The systems modelling being undertaken by our group is demonstrating that the current trajectory isn’t inevitable. “There are actions that can be taken to mitigate the devastating impacts of high youth unemployment on mental health. “Alternative strategies can be tested in the safe environment of a simulator before implementing them in the real world. “Proactive, strategic investments in mental health programs and services will play a vital role in supplementing efforts at increasing community connectedness and the social and economic initiatives already being implemented to help flatten this curve.”
Your stats are garbage. Italy flu deaths in 2016/17 were about 25,000. 17/18 was worse but 30 deaths is ummm completely wrong. Maybe 30,000. https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(19)30328-5/fulltext
Large study of the patients in New York shows that hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin are not effective in treating COVID-19. Hydroxychloroquine shows no benefit against coronavirus in N.Y. study There was also no noticeable advantage for patients that took the drug paired with azithromycin, according to hotly anticipated research. https://www.politico.com/news/2020/...-against-coronavirus-in-new-york-study-249429 A decades-old malaria medicine touted by the president as a coronavirus treatment showed no benefit for patients hospitalized in New York. There was also no noticeable advantage for patients that took the drug paired with the antibiotic azithromycin, according to hotly anticipated research published Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. President Donald Trump had repeatedly championed hydroxychloroquine from the press briefing stage, saying it had “tremendous promise” and was safe because “it’s been used for a long time.” Previous trials had suggested the drug can cause serious heart problems, especially when paired with azithromycin, and the latest study backed up those findings. Researchers said that patients receiving both drugs together were more likely to experience cardiac arrest than those who received one or neither of the therapies. The FDA authorized emergency use of the drug against the coronavirus in March, despite sparse evidence that it could work. It later warned against using the therapy outside of clinical trials, citing potential heart problems. The researchers analyzed 1,438 Covid-19 patients in the state, but it was not a randomized clinical trial, considered the gold standard in research. The state is also running a randomized trial, but results have not yet been released. The president has rarely mentioned hydroxychloroquine in the last few weeks. A portion of the data from the study published Monday had been shared with federal officials roughly two weeks earlier. At the time, researchers conducting the study spoke publicly about not seeing any benefit from hydroxychloroquine after reviewing just half of the cases under analysis. “It’s an unusual situation we all find ourselves in, given the unprecedented nature of this pandemic,” David Holtgrave, dean of the University at Albany School of Public Health and a lead researcher on the study, told POLITICO then about his decision to publicly disclose early findings. “People, I think reasonably so, are asking very urgent questions like ‘Please just tell us if you are observing an effect at this time.’” But Holtgrave stressed that the study only analyzed hospitalized patients who were already severely ill. Other research still in the works is focused on mildly ill patients or whether hydroxychloroquine can be used to prevent Covid-19, though there is still no solid evidence to suggest it can.