Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine for the Prevention and Treatment of COVID-19: A Fiction, Hope or Hype
Author(s): Ved Mundada and Abhishek Ingole*
Abstract
Background: Curative part is one of the most important part of the COVID-19 containment strategy and various drugs are bring repurpose to treat the COVID-19 symptoms as there is no already available standard course of treatment due to novelty of the disease.
Summary: HCQ and CQ have showed their efficacy as antimalarial drugs both in prophylactic role and during treatment of the malaria. The initial studies which showed the successful lowering of viral load and lung injury along with reduced hospital say prompted health care professional all across the globe to widely administer the drugs in almost all patient. But soon, health acre fraternity realized that the drug is not suitable for all section of patient and is creating side effects which are life threatening in nature. In many cases the drugs were found to be effective in inhibiting the virus. Such drug has long list and contain chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine.
Conclusion: Several studies depicting the efficacy of the HCQ and CQ are quite promising and it has also proved to be game changer in many of the cases changing the course of infection in favour of the infected patients. But several concerns which are genuine in nature must be addressed in order to devise a fool proof strategy to curb the spread of COVID-19. Although the drug has shown some negative effects and proven in efficient in some cases, complete denial of the drug is not the option as we should not forget to try every option available to control the pandemic a soon as possible. More study which can highlight the group between the drug is safe should be done to demystify the facts.