3 ms·

That may be, but it's gonna be harder logistically to do a study commencing from onset of symptoms vs at moment of hospitalization. There's also the fact that

That may be, but it's gonna be harder logistically to do a study commencing from onset of symptoms vs at moment of hospitalization. There's also the fact that study makes it less likely that pre-hospitalization HCQ will have any effect either. Applying a Bayesian analysis here, it's now likelier that the true ground truth is simply that HCQ doesn't do anything to COVID-19 at all, not necessarily that it works only in a narrow early window. HCQ has severe side effects too, that require close monitoring and can be fatal. If it's not clearly doing good then it definitely shouldn't be being given to COVID-19 patients. Personally, my hopes are more on remdesivir and favipiravir, both of which are actual antivirals (HCQ is not) and thus were always more promising. HCQ was never the most promising drug candidate, and the only reason we're even talking about it as much as we are is that, for whatever random reason, that's the one Trump heard about first and then fixated on.

Symmetry 7y ago
The study that made me think there might be something to it was looking at people taking it for unrelated illnesses and finding that they weren't tending to show up hospitalized with Covid-19. I'd agree that we really don't have any evidence that giving it to hospitalized patients helps at all. Most antivirals have to be taken at the early stages of an infection. The best looking treatment for people seriously ill with Covid-19 right now seems to be IL-6 inhibitors. That won't stop you from getting sick but might let you avoid intubation.
- CydeWeys 7y ago
  Good to know, I'll keep my eyes out on those studies as well.
- ModernMech 7y ago
  This could be correlation. People taking HCQ have autoimmune problems like lupus, and therefore would be more cautious and practicing social distancing earlier, therefore not getting infected in the first place. It also might be true that people who are agoraphobic shut ins are not contracting covid. But that doesn't tell us much about how covid interacts with agoraphobia.
lbeltrame 7y ago
> There's also the fact that study makes it less likely that pre-hospitalization HCQ will have any effect either. We'll see with the U of Minnesota trial, which attempts to use it as post-exposure prophylaxis. Data (hopefully) will tell us. On favipiravir, the data on the Chinese study wasn't exceptional, but wasn't that bad either. Perhaps the Japanese phase 3 study will be more enlightening.

Symmetry 7y ago

The study that made me think there might be something to it was looking at people taking it for unrelated illnesses and finding that they weren't tending to show up hospitalized with Covid-19. I'd agree that we really don't have any evidence that giving it to hospitalized patients helps at all. Most antivirals have to be taken at the early stages of an infection. The best looking treatment for people seriously ill with Covid-19 right now seems to be IL-6 inhibitors. That won't stop you from getting sick but might let you avoid intubation.

CydeWeys 7y ago
Good to know, I'll keep my eyes out on those studies as well.
ModernMech 7y ago
This could be correlation. People taking HCQ have autoimmune problems like lupus, and therefore would be more cautious and practicing social distancing earlier, therefore not getting infected in the first place. It also might be true that people who are agoraphobic shut ins are not contracting covid. But that doesn't tell us much about how covid interacts with agoraphobia.

lbeltrame 7y ago

> There's also the fact that study makes it less likely that pre-hospitalization HCQ will have any effect either. We'll see with the U of Minnesota trial, which attempts to use it as post-exposure prophylaxis. Data (hopefully) will tell us. On favipiravir, the data on the Chinese study wasn't exceptional, but wasn't that bad either. Perhaps the Japanese phase 3 study will be more enlightening.