Foto: AFP

Hydroxychloroquine not effective in preventing COVID-19 in people exposed to virus, new Canadian-led study finds.

Taking hydroxychloroquine shortly after being exposed to Covid-19 does not help prevent infection in a statistically meaningful way, scientists reported Wednesday (June 3) following a clinical trial.

The medicine has been touted by US President Donald Trump, who has said he used it as a prophylaxis against the novel coronavirus.

But an experiment involving 821 people across the United States and Canada showed it did not work significantly better than a placebo for this purpose.

“While we had hope this drug would work in this context, our study demonstrates that hydroxychloroquine is no better than placebo when used as post-exposure prophylaxis within four days of exposure to someone infected with the new coronavirus,” said Dr. Todd Lee of the MUHC, one of the study’s lead authors.

See a video from one of the researchers on CTV and another article on TheStraitsTimes