COVID-19: Yes, Chloroquine is a “Game Changer” But its Use in Covid-19 is Yet to be Enshrined in “the History of Medicine.”
On March 21st the President of the United States tweeted that “HYDROXYCHLOROQUINE & AZITHROMYCIN, taken together, have a real chance to be one of the biggest game changers in the history of medicine.” Immediately, I remembered in my middle school-days reading about the accidental discovery of Penicillin by Sir Alexander Fleming, a drug that went on to change the world and saved lives during the Second World War. But I also remembered being fascinated in medical school when I started learning all these other uses of Chloroquine, the only drug I have known drug allergies to (itching) which was very effective in treating my malaria when I was a kid growing up in Africa. A mini-review article on this family of drugs made them sound like panacea. Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine have been “repurposed” for several new therapeutic indications different from its original use in curing malaria, and these include infectious (HIV, Q fever, Whipple’s disease, fungal infections) and rheumatologic (systemic lupus erythematosus, antiphospholipid antibody syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, Sjögren’s syndrome) diseases. Their anti-inflammatory, immunomodulating, anti-infective, antithrombotic, and metabolic effects grant them potency as antitumoral (antiproliferative, antimutagenic, and inhibitor of autophagy) agents that also treat neurological disorders (neurosarcoidosis, chronic lymphocytic inflammation, and primary progressive multiple sclerosis). In this regard, these drugs are game changers in their effectiveness in treating these diseases and being well tolerated. Their use, in combination with other drugs, in treating Covid-19 apparently showed some efficacy and safety in only a small group of patients tested in China.
Articles reviewed for this post:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1241367239900778501?s=20
