Hollywood star James Woods on Tuesday hit back at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), calling her “morbidly corrupt” after the California Democrat called President Donald Trump “morbidly obese” while criticizing the president’s usage of hydroxychloroquine against the Chinese coronavirus.
On Monday, President Trump revealed that he has been taking one anti-malaria tablet for roughly a week.
“The frontline workers, many, many of them are taking it. I happen to be taking it, I happen to be taking it. I’m taking it, Hydroxychloroquine. A few weeks ago I started taking it. I think it’s good, I’ve heard a lot of good stories,” the president told reporters at the White House. “I’m not going to get hurt by it. It’s been around for 40 years for malaria, for lupus, for other things. I take it, a lot of frontline workers take it, doctors take it.”
Ask if she was concerned with President Trump taking hydroxychloroquine, Pelosi argued the president shouldn’t not be taking the drug because of his weight.
“As far as the president is concerned, he’s our president and I would rather he not be taking something that has not been approved by the scientists, especially in his age group and in his, shall we say, weight group — morbidly obese they say,” the speaker told CNN host Anderson Cooper.
“So I think it’s not a good idea,” she concluded.
Adding zinc to hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin might help the drug combination resolve some COVID-19 symptoms, a study posted online this week said, though experts say the two-drug treatment’s benefit is questionable and carries health risks.
The findings breathe new life into a treatment regimen that has been touted by political and business leaders even before the results of clinical trials were in, experts said Wednesday.
Studies to date have indicated that the combination offers limited benefits at best, with potentially dangerous side effects.
“There is currently no highly effective agent for COVID-19 that we are aware of,” Dr. Joseph O. Rahimian, an infectious disease specialist at New York University Langone Health and co-author of the zinc study, told UPI.
“It may end up that optimal treatment will include multiple agents and that zinc may be a part of a treatment ‘cocktail,’” he said.
Historically, hydroxychloroquine has been used to treat malaria, while azithromycin is a commonly used antibiotic. Both have been studied in numerous clinical trials since the start of the outbreak of the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2.
To date, research has yielded mixed results. Last month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a warning about “life-threatening” side effects associated with hydroxychloroquine and advised that the drug only be used in hospitalized patients with COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2.
The UPI contributed to this report.
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