Free Republic

Their retraction-admission validates what President Trump stated in the very beginning of the pandemic A leading medical journal has issued a retraction of their endorsement for a study that concluded the anti-viral drug hydroxychloroquine was ineffective against the COVID-19 virus. This retraction appears to validate the claims then-President Trump made about the medication being a frontline drug in the battle in the pandemic. The Lancet, a respected online medical journal, issued an apology to its readers in an edition last year after the retraction. “We deeply apologize to you, the editors, and the journal readership for any embarrassment or inconvenience...

In early June, as controversy swirled over a high-profile study of hydroxychloroquine and COVID-19, Christian Funck-Brentano started receiving aggressive emails, texts and tweets. Funck-Brentano, professor of medicine and clinical pharmacology at Sorbonne Université and Pitié-Salpêtrière University Hospital in Paris, and a colleague had published an editorial in The Lancet alongside the study — purportedly based on data from a company called Surgisphere — citing the results and sounding an alarm about the cardiac risks of hydroxychloroquine. Within days, that paper was retracted, along with a paper in The New England Journal of Medicine about different medications also allegedly based on...

Remember Surgisphere? That was the name of the company that allegedly gathered data from hundreds of hospitals around the world and subsequently published a research paper claiming people treated with hydroxychloroquine were more likely to die than those who were not. That paper made international news at the time, but dozens of doctors questioned the credibility of its data. The paper was eventually retracted and, as of today, it appears Surgisphere is no more: of the sad demise of the second most innovative company in medical research.— Prof Darrel Francis ☺ Mk CardioFellows Great Again (@ProfDFrancis) June 15, 2020...

A retracted study on hydroxychloroquine and news that the coronavirus may be mutating drew reactions Friday night from Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel. "So Lancet, with egg on its face, a renowned journal, is suddenly withdrawing this study," Siegel noted during an appearance on "Tucker Carlson Tonight" A database by Surgisphere Corp. of Chicago was used in an observational study of nearly 100,000 patients that appeared May 22 in The Lancet, an influential medical journal. The study tied the malaria drugs hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine to a higher risk of death in hospitalized patients with the virus. The validity...

The authors 'can no longer vouch for the veracity of the primary data sources' A major medical magazine has retracted a study it published that claimed to have found increased mortality in coronavirus patients who took the drug hydroxychloroquine. The Lancet issued the retraction Thursday afternoon after successive days of questions regarding the study and the data underpinning it, both of which came from the medical analytics company Surgisphere. That study, published on May 22, determined that hydroxychloroquine – a drug repeatedly touted by President Trump as a possible viable treatment for the coronavirus – was "associated with an increased...

A search of publicly available material suggests several of Surgisphere’s employees have little or no data or scientific background. An employee listed as a science editor appears to be a science fiction author and fantasy artist. Another employee listed as a marketing executive is an adult model and events hostess. The Guardian has since contacted five hospitals in Melbourne and two in Sydney, whose cooperation would have been essential for the Australian patient numbers in the database to be reached. All denied any role in such a database, and said they had never heard of Surgisphere. Desai did not respond...

On its face, it was a major finding: Antimalarial drugs touted by the White House as possible COVID-19 treatments looked to be not just ineffective, but downright deadly. A study published on 22 May in The Lancet used hospital records procured by a little-known data analytics company called Surgisphere to conclude that coronavirus patients taking chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine were more likely to show an irregular heart rhythm—a known side effect thought to be rare—and were more likely to die in the hospital. Within days, some large randomized trials of the drugs—the type that might prove or disprove the retrospective study’s...

Medical journal The Lancet on May 29 issued a correction to a recent study which found that antimalarial drugs Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine were linked with an increased risk of mortality in hospitals, and an increased frequency of irregular heart rhythms. The study, titled, “Hydroxychloroquine or chloroquine with or without a macrolide for treatment of COVID-19: a multinational registry analysis,” and published on May 22, included records of 96,032 patients from 671 hospitals in six continents. The patients were hospitalized between Dec. 20, 2019, and April 14, 2020. Patients receiving the anti-malarials were put in four different groups: chloroquine alone, chloroquine...

The use of Real World Evidence in Covid-19 is growing, and that’s a good thing. Properly implemented, RWE has the potential to deliver solid results faster than Randomized Controlled Trials, as I explained in a .css-mckguv{-webkit-transition:background 0.25s var(--ease-in-out-quad),color 0.25s var(--ease-in-out-quad);transition:background 0.25s var(--ease-in-out-quad),color 0.25s var(--ease-in-out-quad);color:var(--theme-ui-colors-accent,#6166DC);}.css-mckguv:visited{color:var(--theme-ui-colors-accent,#6166DC);opacity:0.85;}.css-mckguv:hover,.css-mckguv:focus{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}previous blog post.So I couldn’t miss the largest observational study published to date on the effects of (hydroxy-)chloroquine, in 96 032 hospitalised Covid-19 patients, from an international registry comprising 671 hospitals in six continents:Mehra, M. R., Desai, S. S., Ruschitzka, F., & Patel, A. N. (2020). ‘Hydroxychloroquine or chloroquine with or without a macrolide for treatment of...

NOTE: THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN TRANSLATED USING GOOGLE TRANSLATE FROM FRENCH Jacques Reynes, head of the infectious diseases department at the Montpellier University Hospital, participated in studies on hydroxychloroquine: via the European Discovery and Covidoc trials, specific to Occitania. Treatment stop, Raoult controversy ... he regrets a "runaway" which will undoubtedly not allow to have indisputable data on the effectiveness of the treatment. Q: What do you think of this very critical Lancet study on the interest of hydroxychloroquine, and the cascading effects of the publication of this prestigious scientific journal published last Friday, until the ban on the use...

Questions have been raised by Australian infectious disease researchers about a study published in the Lancet which prompted the World Health Organization to halt global trials of the drug hydroxychloroquine to treat Covid-19. The study published on Friday found Covid-19 patients who received the malaria drug were dying at higher rates and experiencing more heart-related complications than other virus patients. The large observational study analysed data from nearly 15,000 patients with Covid-19 who received the drug alone or in combination with antibiotics, comparing this data with 81,000 controls who did not receive the drug. The findings prompted researchers from around...

"Scientists have raised questions about the dataset published in The Lancet last week that triggered the suspension of clinical trials around the world—and about Surgisphere Corporation, the company behind the study. " Surgisphere Corporation, the company that supplied data for a controversial study on the health risks of hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19 patients published in The Lancet last week (May 22), has found itself in the spotlight after researchers raised questions about the dataset. The Lancet study, which lists Surgisphere founder and CEO Sapan Desai as one of four coauthors, reported harmful effects tied to the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine among patients...

Paris (AFP) - Dozens of scientists have raised concerns over a large-scale study of hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine published in the Lancet that led to the World Health Organization suspending clinical trials of the anti-viral drugs as a potential treatment for COVID-19. Hydroxychloroquine, normally used to treat arthritis, has become one of the most high profile drugs being tested for use against the new coronavirus. This is partly because of comments by public figures including US President Donald Trump, who announced this month he was taking the drug as a preventative measure. In research published in the Lancet on May 22,...