I have a new published article!
The title is "The costly hydroxychloroquine battle in Brazil" and I wrote with Josikwylkson Brito, who is a student of medicine in Brazil. The article was published in Journal of Evidence-based Healthcare. You can read the whole paper in the journal's website.
In the article, we discussed the consequences of the battle around hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in Brazil. We think had the medical community not entered in the HCQ hype "created" by Dider Raoult's junk article and politics, we'd better off in Brazil (and around the world, actually). Sadly, we're spending a lot because due to HCQ - money, time, resources, etc. There are rumors from the Brazilian media that the government is buying HCQ while other really important drugs used in UTI are lacking at least in some hospitals. Moreover, we have not developed a national coordinenated plan of testing, contact tracing and isolation.
The HCQ narrative is also biased because its proponents say we don't have anything to offer to Covid-19 patients, which is wrong. Supportive care, including mechanical ventilation and prone positioning, do save lives. Moreover, we already have the result of the Recovery Trial, which showed that low-dose of dexamethasone for 10 days lowered mortality in patients requiring mechanical ventilation or oxygen. Unfortunately, there were no benefits from those not requiring oxygen support.
The contents of this issue is looking very good. Luis Correia, the journal's editor, and John Mandrola wrote an article asking if pandemics justify the use of non evidence based therapies.
