President Donald Trump directed the FDA to cut the red tape to fast-track a few drugs proven around the world to treat the Wuhan coronavirus.
Trump told the media that the administration “slashed red tape to develop vaccines and therapies as fast as it can possibly be done, long before anybody else was even thinking about doing this.”
From The Wall Street Journal:
“Nothing will stand in our way as we pursue any avenue to find what best works against this horrible virus,” Mr. Trump told reporters at a Thursday White House news conference.Mr. Trump listed drugs used for other purposes that he said might be able to be used in treating the coronavirus.“If things don’t go as planned, it’s not going to kill anybody,” he said.Mr. Trump specifically touted drug company Gilead Sciences Inc., and pointed to several drugs, including Hydroxychloroquine and Chloroquine.
Trump mentioned hydroxychloroquine (Plaquenil), an old malaria drug, and treatment for autoimmune disorders.
A study conducted in Marseilles, France, had “encouraging early results” with the drug against coronavirus.
FDA Commissioner Dr. Syephen Hahn said that “a doctor could ask” for an experimental drug that is available. The FDA has “criteria for that and speedy approval.”
How about the government not bring back that red tape? Unfortunately, patients do not have access to drugs because everything has to go through the government.
Let’s look at Olfert Landt, who owns a small-Berlin company:
Founder of a small Berlin-based company, the ponytailed 54-year-old first raced to help German researchers come up with a diagnostic test and then spurred his company to produce and ship more than 1.4 million tests by the end of February for the World Health Organization.“My wife and I have been working 16 hours a day, seven days a week, ever since,” Landt said by phone about 1 a.m. Friday, Berlin time. “Our days are full.”By contrast, over the same critical period, U.S. efforts to distribute tests ground nearly to a halt, and the country’s inability to produce them left public health officials with limited means to determine where and how fast the virus was spreading. From mid-January until Feb. 28, fewer than 4,000 tests from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were used out of more 160,000 produced.
Landt said that the U.S. has at least ten companies that could have done what his company did to combat the virus. In other words, the U.S. should embrace the private companies to help in these situations.
Also, why not all the time?
The coronavirus has spread through the U.S. for weeks. Yet, the FDA only approved Roche and Thermo Fisher last week to produce tests.
You guys know I have numerous health issues, mainly three autoimmune disorders. If there is a drug out there could help me combat the disorders you better believe I’d try them out under my doctor’s supervision.
One more thing from the press conference: Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams also encouraged young people to donate blood:
“One donation can save up to three lives. Blood centers are opening now and in need of your donation,” Adams said.He continued: “Blood donation is safe and blood centers are taking extra precautions including spacing beds 6 feet apart and disinfecting surfaces between between patients and temperature checking staffs and encouraging donors making appointments ahead of time so we can space them out.”
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