- A scientific study published on July 3 by The Lancet has gone viral on social networks.
- It would prove the preventive effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in the fight against Covid.
- Except that the cases studied are too specific to draw definitive conclusions.
New twist in the debate on the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine against Covid? A study carried out in China and published on July 3 in the famous scientific journal The Lancet, would prove that the level of Covid 19 would be lower in patients taking hydroxycholoroquine. "A Lancet coaster" as the europe-israel.org website claims, the publication of which has been shared by thousands of people on social networks.
🔺China, July 03: Study on 15,000 patients.
“We found that the symptomatic COVID-19 level was lower in patients taking hydroxychloroquine than in patients taking other DMARDs" #Raoult #hydroxychloroquine https://t.co/Xuow2bvBJn
It must be said that the scientific journal had caused controversy last May 22 by publishing a very critical study on chloroquine, the famous treatment developed by Professor Raoult. Researchers had clearly questioned its effectiveness in the fight against Covid.
A much-maligned study had implicated hydroxychloroquine
This study, carried out in the United States, was based on the analysis of data from 96,032 patients hospitalized in 671 hospitals for Covid-19 between December and April 2020. Taken very seriously, the publication had led several countries, including France , to stop for a time the clinical trials of chloroquine on the coronavirus.
But very quickly, many researchers questioned the reliability of this study based on a questionable methodology. Critics who pushed The Lancet to finally withdraw the study for lack of precise data.
If clinical trials have resumed, the effectiveness of treatment for Covid is still under debate. So, is the new study published on July 3 by The Lancet in the process of completely rehabilitating hydroxychloroquine?
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If the study published by The Lancet is real, it does not say in any case that the patients treated with hydroxychloroquine recover from Covid. The scientific article is much more complex than that. Infectious diseases specialist at the Angers University Hospital, Professor Vincent Dubee, who launched a study on chloroquine, has agreed to decrypt this new publication for 20 Minutes. With an important clarification: the work provided was only carried out on people who already suffer at the root of very specific diseases.
" This is a retrospective study done in Hubei province, where the Covid epidemic began. Like everywhere in the world, there are people there who suffer from rheumatic diseases. There are several kinds of treatment for this kind of disease like corticoids or hydroxychloroquine. The researchers followed 6,000 people who are affected by this kind of disease and asked them if they had caught Covid, "explains the professor.
Significant differences also linked to age
A comparison was therefore made between those who had had the coronavirus and the others. And the differences are significant. "The researchers found that people treated for their rheumatism under hydroxychloroquine were less likely to catch Covid than those who took other drugs for this kind of disease," continues Vincent Dubee.
From there to say that hydroxychloroquine makes it possible to avoid Covid, there is a step that the infectious disease specialist does not take. “There is a difference in treatment depending on age. For example, hydroxychloroquine is not a treatment for the elderly who suffer from rheumatic diseases. However, it is precisely this population that is most likely to catch the Covid. In addition, the corticosteroids that are given rather to the elderly to treat this type of disease undoubtedly confer an additional risk of catching the coronavirus ", concludes Vincent Dubee who specifies that the study" does not draw any conclusion on preventive effectiveness of the drug. " Clearly, the miracle cure for the Covid has still not arrived.
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