Research suggests that hydroxychloroquine is no more as effective as a placebo when being exposed to COVID-19

Researchers from the University of Minnesota Medical School have suggested that hydroxychloroquine is no better than a placebo when it comes to preventing symptoms of COVID-19 among people exposed to the virus.

The trial examined eight-hundred and twenty-one healthy and younger adults, with the average age of forty, who had no symptoms at the time. A majority of them had been closer than two metres away from somebody with the virus for more than ten minutes, wearing no PPE, thus instantly placing them at high risk. The results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Participants were either given a placebo or hydroxychloroquine.

Forty-nine of those who received hydroxychloroquine either developed COVID-19 symptoms, or the virus itself, alongside with fifty-eight receiving the placebo who also developed the virus or the same symptoms. No deaths were recorded, and two patients were treated in the hospital.

One of the lead authors of the study and an associate professor of medicine, division of infectious diseases, McGill University, Canada, Dr Todd Lee, stated: “While we had hope this drug would work in this context, our study demonstrates that hydroxychloroquine is no better than placebo when used as post-exposure prophylaxis within 4 days of exposure to someone infected with the new coronavirus.

An associate professor of internal medicine, University of Manitoba, Canada, Dr Ryan Zarychanski, stated: “Our study’s results set politics aside and provide unbiased evidence to guide practice in the prevention of COVID-19 and reinforce the importance of randomised clinical trials as we work together nationally and internationally to combat the novel coronavirus.”