President Donald Trump and his top White House aides have aggressively renewed their promotion of hydroxychloroquine as an effective treatment for Covid-19, as the administration seeks to shift blame for the resurgence of the coronavirus less than 100 days before the November election.
Despite robust medical research showing the decades-old antimalarial is not helpful to Covid-19 patients and could even have adverse effects, Trump and his allies have attacked the Food and Drug Administration for warning against its use and touted the drug as a potential way to tame the pandemic.
White House trade adviser Peter Navarro led the charge Wednesday with his continued defense of hydroxychloroquine in defiance of scientific evidence. But he declined to address the president’s praise for a Houston-area physician who falsely claimed the drug was a coronavirus cure and has promoted other conspiracy theories related to alien DNA and demon sperm.
In an interview on CNN, Navarro argued “there are two gigantic sides” to the hydroxychloroquine debate — even though the FDA withdrew its emergency-use authorization for the drug last month and at least three new studies have found it to be an ineffective treatment.
Navarro, who is assisting with the administration’s coronavirus vaccine development efforts and coordination of the supply chain for personal protective equipment, has clashed repeatedly with public health officials including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country’s top infectious disease expert, over the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine since the early days of the pandemic.
“I’m pleading with you and the American people to look at this drug again,” Navarro said. “Because I literally have tens of millions of tablets sitting in the Strategic National Stockpile that — if we were allowed under the doctors’ advice to get this stuff to people at the first sign of their symptoms — I guarantee you it would cut the amount of time of the symptoms, reduce the duration of the symptoms and save lives.”
Navarro’s advocacy on behalf of hydroxychloroquine has ramped up since a study conducted earlier this month by the Henry Ford Medical Center suggested the drug could help mildly ill patients recover faster from Covid-19. But experts have noted that patients who participated in the trial, which did not include a placebo control group, were not randomized and that many were also on steroids known to help with inflammation.
Meanwhile, video has circulated widely among conservatives on social media this week of Stella Immanuel, a pediatrician and a religious minister, championing hydroxychloroquine the U.S. Supreme Court. After Trump retweeted an excerpt of her speech late Monday, Twitter flagged the post and removed it from the president’s feed. The company also restricted Donald Trump Jr.’s account Tuesday because he shared a version of the same video.
Immanuel has claimed that alien DNA is being used in medicine, that scientists are working to create a vaccine to prevent people from being religious, and that certain gynecological problems are caused by people having sex in their dreams with demons and witches, according to a report Tuesday by The Daily Beast.
Immanuel subsequently tweeted her approval of the story, writing online that “The Daily Beast did a great job summarizing our deliverance ministry and exposing incubus and succubus. Thank you daily beast. If you need deliverance from these spirits. Contact us.”
Speaking to reporters Wednesday outside the White House, Trump said he was “very impressed” by Immanuel and thought “she made sense” in her viral remarks. “She was making a statement about hydroxychloroquine with other doctors that swear by it. They think it’s great. So she was not alone,” he said.
“With hydroxy, all I want to do is save lives. I don’t care if it’s hydroxy or anything else. All I want to do is save lives. If we can save lives, that’s great,” Trump added, describing himself as a “believer” in the drug and asserting that “many, many people agree with me.”
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany also said Wednesday that the president “has a positive outlook” for hydroxychloroquine and simply “wants to save lives,” telling CBS News: “That is his goal here, and that's why he’s promoting this drug as a prophylaxis, but only in consultation with you doctor.”
McEnany also dismissed Trump’s elevation of Immanuel’s dubious medical advice discouraging the use of face masks. “That was a three-second remark in a more than five-minute video. The overall purpose of that video was for the president to illustrate his views on hydroxychloroquine,” she said.
Los Angeles-based physician Simone Gold, the leader of the group known as “America’s Frontline Doctors” that orchestrated the news conference Monday where Immanuel spoke, tweeted Tuesday evening that the group had “just met with Vice President Mike Pence to request the administration’s assistance in empowering doctors to prescribe hydroxychloroquine without political obstruction.”
The president previously applauded Immanuel as “very impressive” at a White House coronavirus briefing Tuesday where he was asked about her fringe health care beliefs. “She said that she’s had tremendous success with hundreds of different patients, and I thought her voice was an important voice. But I know nothing about her,” he told reporters.
Trump, who was prescribed hydroxychloroquine earlier this year, also maintained that “many doctors think it is extremely successful,” saying: “I happen to think it works in the early stages. I think front-line medical people believe that, too. Some, many.”
On Wednesday, Navarro said the president discussed hydroxychloroquine “in a very sophisticated way yesterday,” but added that he had “absolutely nothing to say about” Immanuel or Trump’s invocation of her from the White House podium.
“I’m not going to be your prop in this circus, OK?” he told CNN.
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Flouting scientific evidence, White House trade adviser defends debunked Covid-19 treatment - POLITICO
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