(Health & Medical Publishing Group, 2020-04-02) Decloedt, Eric H.; Allwood, Brian W.; Parker, Arifa; Koegelenberg, Coenraad F. N.; Blockman, Marc; Taljaard, Jantjie; Reuter, Helmuth
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Chloroquine (CQ) is widely advocated as treatment
for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), including the president of
the USA publicly supporting the use of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ)
as a ‘game-changer’ on the social media platform Twitter. CQ and
HCQ are structurally similar, with HCQ having an N-hydroxyl-ethyl
side-chain in place of the N-diethyl group.[1] Currently only CQ is
being marketed in South Africa. We encourage the development of
curative directed therapy against severe acute respiratory syndrome
coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) using appropriate designed trials and
regulatory oversight, and caution against the indiscriminate use of
CQ or HCQ. Careful patient selection is essential, including assessing
prognosis, anticipated benefit and potential harms prior to initiating
CQ/HCQ therapy.