NCDC has warned Nigerians against consuming chloroquine as a prevention or treatment for the novel coronavirus ( COVID-19) infection.
This cautioning comes as a result of United States president, Donald Trump, announcing that the drug had been approved by his country’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat the virus. However, the FDA Commissioner, Stephen Hahn, has since refuted such claims, stating clearly that the effectiveness of the drug is still being tested in a clinical trial.
Trump’s pronouncement has however led to a mad rush for chloroquine in Nigerian pharmacies, even though it had been previously banned in the country.
In a post on its official Twitter page on Friday, March 20, 2020, the NCDC warned Nigerians to not engage in self-medication, and to wait for directives from health workers and authorities.
“@WHO has NOT approved the use of chloroquine for #COVID19 management. Scientists are working hard to confirm the safety of several drugs for this disease.
“Please DO NOT engage in self-medication. This will cause harm and can lead to death,” the agency affirmed .The agency’s director-general, Mojisola Adeyeye, urged Nigerians to desist from using chloroquine as an anti-malaria drug because of the resistance that has been proven to develop in the past.
She said, “In the case of Chloroquine, it has been demonstrated in the literature and with clinical research which is still ongoing, that chloroquine is superior to the placebo.
“NAFDAC is not approving chloroquine as a product that can be used for coronavirus because there is no submission to us for registration. But because it is under clinical trials, NAFDAC approves medicines meant for clinical trials.”Right now, we have asked one company to make a batch of Chloroquine for the purpose of clinical trials.”
Currently the country has 10 active cases of coronavirus, all in Lagos, Ogun and Ekiti. The country’s first two cases have recovered, and are already discharged after testing negative to the virus.
