Study: Usage of touted drug up

Publicity about a small study of a potential COVID-19 treatment was enough to create a 200 percent increase in hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine prescriptions in March. Although the biggest surge was short-lived, almost a half million extra prescriptions were filled over a 10-week period studied by researchers, according to the results published Friday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The national study found that hydroxychloroquine/ chloroquine prescriptions were increasing slowly when the pandemic was declared but shot up after publicity about a nonrandomized study of 19 Chinese patients on March 17. Although that study has been widely criticized, Fox News personalities and President Donald Trump promoted the potential cure.

The week before the publicity, prescriptions were 31 percent higher than normal, but over the next week, the prescriptions shot up 214 percent above normal, said the researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, the Boston Veteran’s Administration Healthcare System and GoodRx.

The number of shortterm prescriptions went up far higher — from 2,208 prescriptions in a week last year to 45,858 this year — an increase of almost 2,000 percent. The increase in shortterm prescriptions (up to 28 tablets) continued for the entire 10-week study, still up more than 800 percent near the end of April.

But the prescriptions for more than 60 tablets had dropped by two-thirds from the year before, a dangerous sign that patients who need the drugs for treatment of lupus or rheumatoid arthritis were struggling to get their normal medicine due to reported shortages of the drug.

The study found that the most popular high blood pressure medicines, losartan, amlodipine and lisinopril, remained relatively steady over the 10-week period despite concerns that they may increase susceptibility to COVID-19. High blood pressure is considered a risk factor for COVID-19, but the drugs that treat it may contribute to that danger, so the researchers had expected the prescription rates to drop.

Another unexpected finding was the lack of a spike in prescriptions for azithromycin, which can treat bacterial infections and was used in early studies along with hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19. Although it was mentioned along with the other drugs, azithromycin did not attract as much attention and prescriptions for the drug fell rather than spiking.