An eccentric French doctor has become a YouTube sensation and been approached by the French president for advice after he claims he has go...
An eccentric French doctor has become a YouTube sensation and been approached by the French president for advice after he claims he has gotten astonishing results using Trump's favorite coronavirus treatment on sick patients.
Didier Raoult, a 68-year-old French infectious-disease specialist, has been using controversial antimalarial drug hydroxycholoroquine to treat COVID-19 patients.
The doctor has a history of defying conventional medicine practices, including blaming the pharmaceutical industry for the state of research, dismissing climate change predictions as 'absurd' and, more baffling still, touting the growing fears in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic 'crazy'.
But Raoult has now become an unlikely hero amid the pandemic, after he said he has given the experimental drug to more than 2,400 patients, with highly positive results.
His stance has divided opinion in France and overseas after many conservative medics warned of the dangers of using the drug to treat the virus, typically used to treat malaria and some autoimmune diseases, due to a lack of evidence over its effectiveness.
Didier Raoult, a 68-year-old French infectious-disease specialist, has been using controversial antimalarial drug hydroxycholoroquine to treat COVID-19 patients, with highly positive results
But panicked members of the public view him as a hero in the pandemic, with his each of his YouTube videos getting at least one million views and people urging their doctors to let them try the medication.
Raoult is not the most conventional of doctors, often sporting a long white beard and a skull ring on his finger in his online videos and being known for challenging conventional medicine throughout his career.
The doctor has spoken out on Twitter and YouTube urging healthcare professionals and governments to not delay their use of hydroxychloroquine until after clinical trials.
Trials could take several months by which point thousands more lives could be lost to the killer virus.
'Some people have gone crazy with methodology,' Raoult argues in a video posted this week.
'Our objective as doctors is to make people better.'
The eccentric doctor has divided opinions in France and overseas after many medics have warned of the dangers of using it to treat the virus while he has become an online sensation with members of the public clamoring to get their hands on the drug
Emmanuel Macron met Raoult this week at his research institute in Marseille (pictured), where the doctor presented his research on coronavirus to the French President
Several experts have argued that further clinical trials are needed to determine its effectiveness in treating coronavirus while others say there isn't time to wait
Emmanuel Macron met Raoult this week at his research institute in Marseille, where the doctor presented his research on coronavirus to the French President.
French authorities have now permitted the drug to be used in 'the most severe cases.'
However, Raoult's approach has come under fire from many in the medical world.
Several experts have argued that further clinical trials are needed to determine its effectiveness in treating coronavirus.
Concerns have also been raised that it can have fatal side effects, especially in people with pre-existing heart conditions.
The controversial drug is a favorite with Donald Trump who has repeatedly plugged the use of hydroxychloroquine as a miracle cure for the deadly virus
More than 50 cases have been reported where coronavirus patients have developed serious heart problems after taking hydroxychloroquine, according to a doctor at France's drug-safety monitoring center.
Raoult said that 10 of the 2,400 patients he has treated using the drug have died, and recommends it be administered at an early stage of the virus.
Jean-Paul Stahl, a French doctor of infectious diseases, told the Wall Street Journal that he was turning patients away after they have seen Raoult's campaign and are now asking for the drug.
'We have to say no,' Stahl said. 'It's a matter of patient safety.'
During his daily coronavirus press briefings, the president has repeatedly plugged the use of hydroxychloroquine as a miracle cure for the deadly virus.The controversial drug is a favorite of Donald Trump's.
He has even said he'd consider taking hydroxychloroquine himself.
The president announced Sunday the government has purchased and stockpiled 29 million doses of the hydroxychloroquine to send to hot spot areas of the country battling the virus.
'I want people to live and I'm seeing people dying,' he explained Sunday about why he continually touts the drug, which scientists say has not gone under enough testing in regards to the coronavirus.
'I've seen people that are going to die without it, and you know the expression, when that's happening, they should do it. What really do we have to lose? We also have this medicine's been tested for many years for malaria and for lupus, so it's been out there. It is a very strong powerful medicine, but it doesn't kill people,' the president said.
'But what do I know? I’m not a doctor,' Trump conceded. 'I'm not acting as a doctor. I'm saying, do what you want.'
The president has also argued there isn't time to conduct in-depth studies on hydroxychloroquine's effect on the coronavirus.
'I would love to go to a laboratory and spend a couple of years testing something. We don't have time. We don't have two hours because there are people dying right now,' he said.
But his claims have often contradicted his own advisers, who say studies of its effectiveness are still too small to prove it is safe.
Dr Tony Fauci has previously warned against seeing the malaria medication as a wonder drug, saying Americans should not consider it a 'knock out' drug when it comes to treating the coronavirus.
'We’ve got to be careful that we don’t make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug. We still need to do the kinds of studies that definitely prove whether any intervention is truly safe and effective,' he told 'Fox & Friends' last week.
Some doctors in the US have already started treating patients with the drug but there have been reports of at least one death connected to the medication.
Lack of availability is also sparking a worrying trend for people self-medicating with hydroxychloroquine.
Demand for a cure is ramping up as the US death toll topped 20,000.
The US has now become the deadliest nation in the world for the pandemic, surpassing Italy.
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