Why Nigeria Should Continue With Hydroxychloroquine Clinical Trials

Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine are some of the few drugs under clinical trials for the treatment of covid-19. However, the world health organization (WHO) recently suspended the trails. This was due to a report from Lancet on the safety concern. They said the drug is likely the cause for an increase in covid-19 patients dying. Many countries joined WHO and pulled the plug.

There are many debates aboubt the move by WHO. It is a normal process in the face of a new drug. But hydroxychloroquine is a registered drug used previously for treating malaria and rheumatoid arthritis well tolorated. Is it really necessary to suspend the trials due to one report from one side of the world? What if the drug is race dependent and is suitable for other parts of the world? Here is what the world thinks.

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Race And Drugs

There have been countless debates as to how drugs work for different races. The major debate has been on hypertension among black-americans. It has been established that black-americans have more cases of hypertension than their white counterparts. And treatment procedure for black-americans is almost different from white-americans. It is believed that race has a major role to play.

Why Race Does Not Affect Drug

The argument is that race is a poor proxy for wide genetic variability among humans. Citing the drug BiDil combination drug use in the treatment of hypertension in black-americans, they think some of the black-americans whose genetic makeup is different will not benefit from it and white-americans whose genetic makeup matches that of the drug will not. Companies do the race drug thing because it is more convenient.

The argument further went on to say most black-americans suffer social depression due to life in the USA which is one of the causes of hypertension. This is not the case with blacks in many other parts of the world. This shows that race has little or nothing to do with disease or how drugs work.

If we look at the argument very well, what they are trying to say in essence is that if the drug is harmful in one clinical trial in a particular race, it can serve as the global result. We can tie this to why the WHO decides to suspend clinical trials of hydroxychloroquine.

Why Race Affect Drugs

But let us look at it this other way. People of the same race have similar genetic makeup. For example, irinotecan is a colorectal cancer drug which causes an adverse drug reaction (ADR). The ADR was traced to at least two genetic deficiencies. One deficiency is more common in whites and blacks with the other in Asians. So if the research focuses on only whites, the other genetic deficiency will not have been discovered.

Conclusion

From the debate, it is better to consider so many things. It is not good to throw away a potential treatment with one trial from one race. Let others see how well this drug works well in their own race before throwing it into archives.

Read Also: Preventing covid-19

The USA were the few countries that continued with the clinical trials. Just a few hours ago, the federal drug agency (FDA) reported some adverse effects and decided to end it. This shows that the drug worsen covid-19 patient cases and even reduce the efficacy of remdesivir, an antiviral agent under clinical trials for treatment of covid-19.

Hydroxychloroquine

Nigeria Hydroxychloroquine Trials

The federal government of Nigeria never halted their clinical trials on hydroxychloroquine. There were a series of meetings between WHO representatives and the federal government on the WHO decision to suspend the trial. However, the government stock with their plans.

Hydroxychloroquine is not a new drug to Nigerians. The drug is well tolerated. The only problem is if the covid-19 can affect its bioavailability and make it dangerous and or if it will work as touted by the president of the United States of America (USA) for treating covid-19 patient.

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