Why President Trump is at odds with his medical experts over using malaria drugs against Covid-19
One of the most wrenching questions in medicine has been playing out to garish effect in White House press conferences.
The question is this: In an emergency, like the exploding pandemic of the coronavirus that causes Covid-19, how much data should doctors require before they use a medicine? President Donald Trump has made clear that he thinks two old malaria drugs, hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine, should be deployed quickly against the coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But his own lieutenants, the heads of the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, have been hesitant.
