NEW STUDY: Trump’s ‘Miracle Covid Cure’ — Promoted Heavily on Fox News — Linked to 17,000 Deaths

(AP Photo/John Locher)

A new scientific study has found that there was an 11 percent increase in mortality rate linked to the prescription of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for Covid-19.

The study was published in the February issue of Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy and reveals researchers using data from a study published in the Nature scientific journal.

Yes, this is the controversial treatment that former President Donald Trump encouraged the nation to take and even boasted of taking it following exposure to the virus, and was pushed hard by various personalities on Fox News, despite medical experts insisting that there was no science to support its efficacy.

Researchers have found that those who took the unproven treatment were 11% more likely to die, which they argue is evidence that illustrates “the hazard of drug repurposing with low-level evidence for the management of future pandemics.”

Highlights from the study sum up its findings:

•Hydroxychloroquine was prescribed in hospitalised patients with Covid-19 despite of the low-level evidence.

•Subsequently, HCQ use was associated with an 11% increase in the mortality rate in a meta-analysis of randomized trials.

•The number of hydroxychloroquine related deaths in hospitalised patients is estimated at 16,990 in six countries.

•These findings illustrate the hazard of drug repurposing with low-level evidence for the management of future pandemics.

So, the treatment that medical experts warned against as treatment actually lessened a patient’s chances of survival? Huh. In hindsight, it makes total sense.

But hindsight always paints a clearer picture, and the picture it paints of conservative media figures going ALL IN on touting snake oil as some sort of wonder drug deserves attention.

In May 2020, during the height of the pandemic, hydroxychloroquine became a remarkably controversial topic in political media. Rachel Maddow even dedicated a segment to ridicule Fox News for promoting it, featuring a supercut of nearly 30 instances of Trump, as well as Fox hosts Brian Kilmeade, Steve Doocy, Lou Dobbs, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham touting the drug’s potential if not outright singing the drug’s praises.

From Mediaite’s report in April 2020, Maddow said:

“Beginning in middle of March, hydroxychloroquine was mentioned hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times on the Fox News channel, particularly by its primetime hosts, and by the president, from the White House podium,” Maddow explained, before noting a stark reversal about a week ago, when those mentions disappeared almost overnight. “They just stopped bringing it up. And we don’t know why it is,” Maddow noted. “But yesterday, we did get the results of a new study, which is yet to be peer recovered, but it is the largest to date involving the use of hydroxychloroquine among 368 veterans in veterans hospitals across the U.S. In that trial, the drug was found to have no benefit, and there were actually more deaths reported among those who were given the drug than those who were given standard care.”

Laura Ingraham even met with Trump to promote the so-called miracle drug and notably once laughed in the face of a guest who had the temerity to question its effectiveness in treating Covid.

Then-Attorney General Bill Barr even weighed in on the Hydroxy controversy, touting its effectiveness and claiming the media, citing the medical community’s reluctance to promote it (because of research), represented a “jihad” against the Trump administration.

Mediate has published nearly three dozen stories about hydroxychloroquine since the pandemic started in the Spring of 2020, and reviewing them now, following the just-published study, tells an ugly story of how Trump and so many conservative media personalities shared dangerous and deadly information.

Looking back at the earliest days of the pandemic reveals a lot of missteps in how we handled it, but it was a strange and scary time that felt like the opening scene to a dystopian sci-fi film for many. Conservative media has made a LOT of hay over the seemingly over-cautious decisions to keep schools closed, to social distance, and to “lockdown,” which, at the time, seemed prudent, but now we know better.

That said, the irresponsible promotion of hydroxychloroquine actually proved deadly. So maybe this a development from which we can all learn. Do not take medical advice from political figures, regardless of what side of the aisle they call home.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.