Abstract
<span lang="EN-MY" style="font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><p style="text-align:justify;text-justify:inter-ideograph;line-height:150%"> <p style="text-align:justify;text-justify:inter-ideograph;line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-MY" style="font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">The growing CoViD-19 (novel coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic and the number of deaths is becoming a big concern across the world. There is a need for an immediate therapeutic solution to prevent the spread of the disease further and prevent the number of CoViD-19 associated deaths across the world. The healthcare professionals and the public at large are asking questions about the evidence surrounding the use of chloroquine (CQ) and hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in the management of CoViD-19. Both CQ and HCQ had been recently used clinically across the world to treat severe pneumonia associated with COViD-19, however, the evidence is very weak due to the lack of randomised clinical trials and misinterpretation of clinical evidence by the non-scientific community. This article presents a critical review of clinical and scientific evidence around the use of CQ and HCQ in CoViD-19 available to date and highlighted the issues concerning the safety and toxicity of CQ/HCQ if permitted for general use by the public. Due to lack of evidence around CQ/HCQ in preventing the CoViD-19, its potential risk of fatal cardiac arrhythmia, and greater risk of self-use and harm in the developing world, it is recommended that the use of CQ/HCQ should only be initiated by specialist clinician dealing with CoViD-19 outbreak to treat CoViD-19 associated pneumonia under close cardiac monitoring.</span> <p style="text-align:justify;text-justify:inter-ideograph;line-height:150%"> </span>
Highlights
In December 2019, a novel coronavirus, identified as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), has caused an outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (CoViD-19), starting in Wuhan, China and spreading quickly to the rest of China and to more than 190 countries worldwide
At 6th day post-therapy, the virus was no longer detectable in 70% of the samples taken from patients who were treated with hydroxychloroquine
On 25th March 2020, the government of United Kingdom issued a warning that ‘CQ/HCQ is not licensed in the UK to treat CoViD-19 related symptoms or prevent infection’ and advised that ‘until we have clear and definitive evidence that these treatments are safe and effective for the prevention/treatment of CoViD-19, they should only be used for this purpose within a clinical trial’ (GOV.UK, 2020)
Summary
Should Chloroquine or Hydroxychloroquine be allowed for immediate use in CoViD-19?. Syed Shahzad Hasana*, Chia Siang Kowb, Hamid A. Merchanta aUniversity of Huddersfield, Queensgate, Huddersfield, HD1 3DH, United Kingdom; bInternational Medical University (IMU), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
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