The reaction was quick. The Minister of Health Olivier Véran asked on Saturday the High Council of Public Health (HCSP) to propose "within 48 hours a review of the derogatory rules of prescription" of various treatments such as hydroxychloroquine, after the publication of a study pointing its ineffectiveness and its risks for Covid-19 patients.
«Following the publication in The Lancet of a study alerting to the ineffectiveness and risks of certain treatments of Covid-19 including hydroxychloroquine, I asked the HCSP to analyze it and offer me within 48 hours a review of the derogating prescription rules, "said the minister in a tweet.
Apart from clinical trials, France has already restricted the use of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in hospitals only and only for serious cases on the collegial decision of doctors.
This molecule, derived from the antimalarial chloroquine, has known an unprecedented notoriety since the end of February since Professor Didier Raoult, of the University Hospital Institute (IHU) in Marseille, relayed a small, little detailed Chinese study, claiming that the chloroquine phosphate showed signs of efficacy in patients with SARS-CoV2.
Two critical studies
Two studies, one Chinese and one French, published last week, however, found that the HCQ did not significantly reduce the risks of admission to intensive care or death in patients hospitalized with pneumonia due to Covid-19. And another study, with data on a total of 96,000 patients, published in The Lancet on Friday, to which Olivier Véran alludes in his tweet, concluded that neither chloroquine nor the HCQ are effective against Covid -19 in hospitalized patients. According to this study, these molecules even increase the risk of death and cardiac arrhythmia.
PODCAST.Coronavirus: who is Didier Raoult, convinced of having the miracle cure?