Bahrain among first countries to use Hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus
Bahrain was one of the first countries in the world
to administer Hydroxychloroquine to treat active coronavirus cases, the
Chairman of the Supreme Council of Health, Head of the National Taskforce for
Combating the coronavirus, Sheikh Mohamed bin Abdullah Al Khalifa said.
Hydroxychloroquine “is reported to have had a
profound impact when used to treat the symptoms exhibited by active COVID-19
cases,” state news agency BNA reported.
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The Kingdom first used the drug on 26 February,
following the registration of its first case on 24 February.
There are 225 active coronavirus cases, four deaths,
and 190 discharged in Bahrain as of Wednesday, according to the ministry of
health.
Hydroxychloroquine
Hydroxychloroquine is both an anti-malarial and an
anti-inflammatory used to treat auto-immune disorders such as lupus and
rheumatoid arthritis, but it has been tried with some success against the
illness caused by the new coronavirus.
It’s being embraced because there are no approved
vaccines or treatments against the highly contagious respiratory illness, so
even the most ill patients largely receive only supportive care such as
breathing assistance.
US President Donald Trump last week called on US
health regulators to expedite potential therapies aimed at treating COVID-19
amid the fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak, pointing specifically to Gilead
Sciences Inc’s experimental antiviral drug Remdesivir and the generic
antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine.
In Brazil, the clinical trial of hydroxychloroquine,
which is being led by the Albert Einstein Hospital in Sao Paulo in conjunction
with other Brazilian hospitals, began on Monday and is testing the
effectiveness of the drug in combination with the antibiotic azithromycin on
patients with COVID-19.
Trump and Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro have
promoted hydroxychloroquine and the related chloroquine as potential treatments
for coronavirus infections as they try to assuage concerns over the virus and
shield their economies from the fallout.
In India, the government banned on Wednesday the
exports of hydroxychloroquine and other formulations of the malaria drug while
it is being tested for an illness that has sickened about 459,000 people worldwide.
