Interpretation:
1) 181 patients, 84 got HCQ, 97 didn't. Not large group, but on comparable to other HCQ studies.
2) Adult patients age 18 -80 years (Median age 60) with PCR-confirmed SARS-CoV2 infection, AND required oxygen by mask or nasal prongs (a WHO progression score of 5)
3) They excluded patients who started HCQ before being admitted to the hospital.
4) 71% were men. There was a 7 day delay from symptoms to admission to hospital
5) HCQ was started within 48 hours after admission to hospital, when patient was already REQUIRING OXYGEN and very ill
6) Only 17 (20%) out of 84 patients got Azithro with HCQ. 64 (76%) got amoxicillin and clavulanic acid.
7) The clinical features of patients included patients with
predominance of men and of patients with cardiovascular comorbidities and/or obesity.
8) Almost all patients had bilateral pneumonia, and 75% moderate or severe lung infiltrate.
9) COVID19 pneumonia progression is associated with “cytokine storm” which worsens the patient's illness. Most of the patients included in this study had an inflammatory syndrome defined by C-reactive-protein >40 mg/l, which suggests that a cytokine storm had already begun!!!
10) HCQ related cardiac events may be explained by the use of high-dose HCQ in elderly patients with renal impairment and frequent drug interactions.
11) LIMITATIONS: "Our study has several limitations." First....treatment was not randomly assigned
and potential unmeasured confounders may bias our results... go ahead and read other limitations in the study.
So in summary, they picked highest severity patients (7 days after symptoms), already on O2, all had cytokine storm, with bilateral pneumonia, treatments were not randomly assigned, and only 20% of HCQ group got HCQ+AZT. No one in the media will tell you this.
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