S.Korea had set up a COVID-19 Clinical Task Force, which published guidelines for physicians on 13th Feb 2020; these guidelines recommended chloroquine (medicine similar to Hydroxychloroquine) to patients with serious conditions.
On 13 March 2020, there was an article published in China, which also recommended chloroquine to improve the success rate of the treatment.
Reports began coming in from different corners and a village doctor in US posted a video on Social Media addressing Trump, claiming that he treated patients with combination of Hydroxychloroquine, zinc and an antibiotic and had 100% success rate.
But its popularity reached current levels, when celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz (who had become famous after appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show) made multiple appearances in media, praising claims made by French doctors.
The French doctors had published research (end-March) claiming that six COVID-19 patients after taking Hydroxychloroquine and an antibiotic for 6 days tested negative.
But the French report also suggested that 3 other patients who were also given the same medication were too sick to be tested after 6 days and one patient died as well.
But by then Donald Trump had popularised the combination of Hydroxychloroquine and antibiotic Azithromycin, suggesting that even if it was not as effective as claimed, no one will die if he/she took it.
India comes into the picture because it is the biggest producer of the drug; some say it produces 70% of world’s supply & has the capacity to quickly ramp up production further from the current capacity of 200 million tablets per month.
India had put restrictions because it needs around 24 million tablets per year, as of today, for treating malaria, lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis and wasn’t sure of the future requirement after considering factors like people hoarding it.
Right now, the world is divided on the effectiveness of the drug.
Those in favour are basing their logic on various findings that suggest Zinc restricts the replication of virus but unlike virus, it can’t enter the cell on its own.
It needs an access card (ionophore) to make the entry, and Hydroxychloroquine is that access card.
Those against the drug usage at this stage say that the sample size is not big enough and repurposing the drug without sufficient clinical trials can have harmful effects.
