The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention removed dosage guidance from its website for a pair of antimalarial drugs President Donald Trump has been pushing as effective treatments for coronavirus.
The move comes three days after Reuters reported the CDC added the dosing information to its website after Mr Trump had pressed for the drugs – hydroxychloroquine and chrloroquine – to be more widely offered for use in treating the virus.
Prior to its removal, the CDC page included anecdotal eence of the drugs’ effectiveness rather than citing clinical trial data, using the line “some U.S. clinicians have reported anecdotally,” before making dosage suggestions.
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Dr Lynn Goldman, dean of the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University, told Reuters she was surprised the CDC would include that information.
“Why would CDC be publishing anecdotes?” she asked. “That doesn’t make sense. This is very unusual.”
Ms Goldman was one of several medical professionals perplexed and disappointed that the CDC would push drug recommendations without citing or relying on clinical data.
The updated language removes any reference to anecdotal results, instead stating that there are no known treatments for the virus.
“There are no drugs or other therapeutics approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to prevent or treat COVID-19.”
One of the doctors who initially criticised the CDC, Jeffrey Flier, formerly the dean of Harvard Medical School, called the new language “substantially improved.”
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“It states the facts without in effect recommending that physicians prescribe the drugs despite a lack of adequate eence,” he said.
Mr Trump – as well as his lawyer, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and his trade adviser Peter Navarro – have pushed the drug, even recommending its use despite trial results.
Dr Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease doctor – has cautioned against rushing in to use the drug without proper testing.
“I think we’ve got to be careful that we don’t make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug,” he told Fox News. “We still need to do the kinds of studies that definitively prove whether any intervention, not just this one, any intervention is truly safe and effective.”
Despite this, Mr Giuliani has pushed for the drug based on the advice of a self-described “simple country doctor” named Vladimir Zelenko, and Fox News anchor and Trump sycophant Laura Ingraham travelled to the White House with a pair of doctors who vouched for the drug.
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Mr Navarro questioned Mr Fauci’s reservations, saying on CNN that “doctors disagree about things all the time” and claiming he was qualified to interpret data about clinical drugs based on his background as a “social scientist.”
Mr Trump was likewise unwilling to wait for proper testing.
“We don’t have time,” he said. “We don’t have two hours because there are people dying right now.
