US running low on more than a dozen drugs needed to treat coronavirus patients

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

As hospitals around the U.S. grapple with a rising number of coronavirus patients falling critically ill, the country has started running low on the drugs used to treat those patients.

Premier, which works with hospitals around the US in part by helping them purchase medications, on Tuesday pulled together a list of drugs at risk of shortages. Some of the treatments are officially in shortage, according to the US Food and Drug Administration. Others are seeing demand skyrocket, making it difficult for hospitals to get their orders filled.

"Any time you're not seeing orders 100% fulfilled is when you start having an early warning sign that a shortage may be coming," Soumi Saha, a senior director of advocacy at Premier, told Business Insider.

That includes antibiotics like azithromycin and antivirals like chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, which as of Tuesday are considered in shortage by the FDA.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/us-running-low-on-more-than-a-dozen-drugs-needed-to-treat-coronavirus-patients/ar-BB121AxF?li=BBnb7Kz

[lapfog_1]

1. Remember that India banned the export

of all drugs and most precursor chemicals about 3 to 4 weeks ago.

Hello... supply chain.

[Tweedy]

2. Oxygen and ventilation in worst case scenarios are the only known treatment

combined with Tylenol to lower fever.

chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine are the drugs our incompetent money grabbing president was pushing.

The FDA cleared those drugs for use despite the lack of proof that they were either safe or effective used as a treatment for SARS covid 2 2019. People have already died from ingesting them in hopes that the drugs would protect them from this virus.

There will be drug shortages and may already be. Yet, the anti malaria/lupus drugs listed in your post are not treatments in any medical minds not controlled by the political huckster in chief.

[Hoyt]

3. Why are doctors prescribing hydrochloroquine if it's not effective? Here's latest from NYT today.

It may not be the perfect clinical trial, but it's more evidence the drug, and others similar, may well do something.

"The malaria drug hydroxychloroquine helped to speed the recovery of a small number of patients who were mildly ill from the coronavirus, doctors in China reported this week."

"Cough, fever and pneumonia went away faster, and the disease seemed less likely to turn severe in people who received hydroxychloroquine than in a comparison group not given the drug. The authors of the report said that the medication was promising, but that more research was needed to clarify how it might work in treating coronavirus disease and to determine the best way to use it.

"“It’s going to send a ripple of excitement out through the treating community,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University."

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/health/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-malaria.html

That's going to make more docs prescribe it.

[Tweedy]

4. Because the FDA waived its safe and effective requirements for the drug

Under a compassionate release based on no medically reliable study.

After pharmaceutical salesmen bombarded docs to get them to sign a letter to the FDA to waive it's safe and effective requirements for the drug.

So, we have no clue if this drug is safe for patients with SARS-2 covid 2019

We do not know if it might be safe for some, but horribly unsafe (& maybe even painful) for others because drugs can effect populations differently. Think young, old, male, female, diabetic, heart disease, etc.

And we do not know if it is effective against SARS-2 covid 2019.

https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/31/we-shouldnt-rush-to-use-an-unproven-drug-to-treat-the-coronavirus/

So, perhaps we should find that out before we spend billions on these drugs, potentially killing more people! Instead, we should spend those billions on personal protective equipment (PPE) for our healthcare workers and first responders who are out there risking their lives to save ours

We DO KNOW that it will be unbelievably unsafe and horribly ineffective if we lose untold numbers of healthcare workers and first responders to quarantine, delays in testing, infection and tragically death.

This president is very good at pumping up a thing and selling that thing to his marks. He is very good at hiding the ball and general confidence trickery. Don't be diverted.

We need PPE NOW!!

Yet, even a conman tells the truth by accident on occasion, true, but let's not risk this drug until we at least know it does not increase pain. And if not that, let's at least only give it to patients who appear terminal.

[Hoyt]

5. Actually, the minute it was approved to treat malaria, doctors could prescribe it

for off-label use. It’s also approved for RA and Lupus.

Point is, some doctors believe it works, or is not dangerous enough not to try it in current situation. Your argument is with them.

[Tweedy]

6. No

Doctors trying something with patients they believe are terminal makes sense.

There is no argument with that.

Pharmaceutical salesman rushing docs in this pandemic to get them to sign a petition urging the FDA to say this drug should get a compassionate exception (usually only reserved for terminal patients) are behaving badly in a crisis.

Have we seen this before from pharmaceutical interests? Why, yes, we have. Opiod addiction is still with us, thanks to at home prescriptions for such things as recovery from wisdom tooth extraction.

The huckster in chief began this. The pharmaceutical lobbyists pushed it.

Now, a drug that is needed for lupus is much more expensive and supply is rapidly diminishing.

Ever wonder why this never happens with generics or drugs without patent protection? If not, think about it for awhile.