Study that supported the use of Chloroquine for Covid-19 is invalidated

Last Tuesday (17), Elsevier, the publisher responsible for publishing the scientific study that stated the effectiveness of using Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine in cases of Covid-19, went public with its retraction and demonstrating the ineffectiveness of prescribing such drugs. medications to combat the virus.

On that occasion, in 2020, the article published by the French infectious disease doctor, Didier Raoul, supported the use of Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine as drug treatment in patients infected by Sars-CoV-2 and ended up influencing the way in which governments faced the pandemic which brought chaos to the contemporary world.

The study, initially supported by the French government of Emannuel Macron and later rejected, was produced by 18 authors in total, headed by infectious disease specialist Didier Raoult. In the face of all the despair and lack of knowledge generated by the virus that decimated thousands of lives, the work published by Elsevier, at first, brought hope to an uncertain scenario.

It is worth remembering that the medicine, debated as effective for Covid-19, is actually recommended worldwide for the treatment of Malaria. In Brazil, the disease has a higher incidence in the states of the Amazon region, being considered an endemic disease.

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_{Image of a Covid-19 test (Photo: reproduction/Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto/ Getty Images Embed)}

Covid-19 in Brazil

With a chaotic scenario and an increasing number of daily deaths, several countries bet on the miraculous treatment developed by the French scientist, including the Brazilian government, under the command of then president Jair Messias Bolsonaro.

In Brazil, Bolsonaro was responsible for propagating the theory and facilitating the prescription of the combo: Chloroquine, Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin as a medical treatment. Even amidst much criticism and with the emergence of research that refuted the effectiveness of the treatment, the then president followed through with the recommendation and influenced the Ministry of Health's decision-making in tackling the pandemic, compromising the provision of effective treatment for thousands. of Brazilians.

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_{The then President of Brazil, Jair Messias Bolsonaro, in 2020, holding a box of the drug Chloroquine (Photo: reproduction/Sergio Lima/Getty Images Embed)}

What scientists say

In a publication, publisher Elsevier stated that it had found several methodological flaws in the study by the scientist who founded the medicinal theory. The publisher also highlighted the lack of ethics in carrying out the research and concluded that the study had no scientific validity.

Today, after years of research with serious methodologies, the most important bodies of scientific medical studies — such as Recovery, in England, Hycovid in France, and also studies carried out by the World Health Organization — prove the ineffectiveness of the medication combo defended by Didier Raoul and thus close another chapter in recent global medical history.

Featured Photo: Bottle of Chloroquine (Reproduction/ George Frey/ AFP/ Getty Images Embed)