NEW DELHI : A plan to give the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine to thousands of people in Mumbai’s crowded slums to prevent coronavirus infections has temporarily been shelved, officials said Wednesday.
Health officials in Mumbai said that a test to prove the efficacy of the much touted but largely untested drug was still in the cards, but that for now they would follow federal Indian guidelines.
India, which reached the grim milestone of over 1,000 deaths from the virus on Wednesday, is one of the few countries that has pushed for the use of hydroxychloroquine, or HCQ, as a precautionary measure among high-risk groups such as health care workers or people who have come in close contact with Covid-19 patients.