The alleged remedy was at the heart of all hopes at the start of the pandemic. But in recent weeks, its popularity rating - and that of its promoter, Professor Didier Raoult, seem to be crumbling.
In the past two weeks, at least four different studies, including a large international study, have questioned the effectiveness of chloroquine, an antimalarial, in the treatment of Covid-19. Their result is always the same: the use of choloroquine, according to their editors, is ultimately not effective against infection with the new coronavirus.
All these researchers are also concerned about the risks associated with the side effects of the popular drug in areas frequently affected by malaria, which range from digestive disorders to heart disorders.
"It looks like it's a terrible poison"
Exaggerated concerns, according to former Minister of Health Philippe Douste-Blazy, who launched a petition requesting the prescription of the drug for Covid-19 patients who are not in serious condition. “Look at the accidents of hydroxychloroquine over the past thirty years. There are hardly any, ”he said already on the CNews set mid-week.
Chloroquine: "We went mad, brutally, in the space of two months, it looks like it is a terrible poison", Philippe Douste-Blazy, former Minister of Health, live on #Punchline pic.twitter.com/iwyLV7Bgk2
- CNEWS (@CNEWS) May 19, 2020"And brutally, in the space of two months, it looks like it is a terrible poison", he quips, while warning against self-prescription. The cardiologist by training also recalled the existence of a South Korean study, touting it, the decrease in passages in intensive care thanks to the administration of the drug with an antibiotic. This study, which was recently published and carried out on 270 patients, has not yet been approved by a reading committee.
For the collective “Let the doctors prescribe”, which defends the possibility of following Professor Raoult's protocol for doctors, the latest study questioning hydroxychloroquine is too sloppy to be credible. “The patients were hospitalized between December 20 and April 14, for publication on May 21, with four signatory authors. Hat! A record of efficiency for the collection of data, translation [...], writing, reviewing and publication! ", He mocks in a press release listing a dozen grievances.
"I'm happy with this treatment"
"There are studies, and there are results," agrees Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, president of Debout La France, with the Parisian. “Studies, you have to see how they are done, we have them in every way, we hear everything and its opposite. Some do not follow Dr. Raoult's protocol, "laments the deputy from Essonne, who wonders:" Who funded this study [in reference to the one published in The Lancet, editor's note]? […] We criticize the only treatment that has effects. If it cost 100 times more, we'd find it great, ”he says. And to conclude: "A proverb fits well with this situation: When you want to kill your dog, you say he has rabies ".
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It is therefore useless to preach the word of these studies, published in number and carried out in several international establishments, to the convinced. "I haven't changed my mind," reacts to Parisian Renaud Muselier, LR president of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, where access to chloroquine has been facilitated. “Me, I'm glad I got this treatment. It gave results and five times less deaths compared to Paris ”, defends the doctor by training, resuming the calculation however wobbly of his former classmate, Didier Raoult.
In the South, the controversial scientist seems to have won over a large number of elected officials. Like Christian Estrosi, mayor LR of Nice, who benefited from this treatment in March after being contaminated. "Perfect or imperfect, there was a solution," he said on BFMTV on Friday, while deploring the critics who condemn the director of the IHU in Marseille.
"I don't understand why we indulged in this kind of media lynching of someone who works, someone who does not want to get involved in all these debates, someone who, instead of spending his time to be a commentator on the television sets, prefers to devote himself to his patients ”, saddened Christian Estrosi.
Questioning at the Ministry of Health
Professor François Bricaire, infectious disease specialist, former head of the infectious and tropical diseases department at Hôpital de la Salpêtrière, has a unique position. "Denials are part of scientific research," he tempers, "not surprised" by the results of these studies. However, he had signed the famous petition of Philippe Douste-Blazy. "I do not advocate the general use of chloroquine at all, but I wanted it to be made available in hospitals" for non-serious cases, "when we had nothing else," explains the infectious disease specialist.
The Ministry of Health intends to go in the opposite direction. Saturday, in reaction to the latest Lancet study, Olivier Véran asked the High Council for Public Health (HCSP) to propose "within 48 hours a review of the overriding prescription rules" for various treatments. These derogating rules made it possible in particular to prescribe hydroxychloroquine in severe cases in hospitals, on the collective decision of doctors.