Accra, May 26, GNA – The Ghana Health Service on Tuesday announced that the COVID-19 case Management Team will meet to decide on steps to take after the World Health Organisation suspended the use of Hydoxychloroquine to treat CoVID-19 on safety grounds.
Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, the Director General of the Ghana Health Service, said a communique would be issued in due course to that effect.
The Director General made this known during the questions and answers section at a media briefing to provide situational update on COVID-19 case management in the country.
He said the drug was only used for critical cases and not for routine ones.
He said cases that were being managed from home do not take this medicine.
“So we are waiting for the meeting to end to know the outcome and we will decide on what next to do,” he said.
The WHO suspended the study of Hydroxychloroquine as COVID-19 treatment to review safety concerns due to report of higher death risks.
The WHO, on Monday, temporarily dropped hydroxychloroquine — the anti-malarial drug – saying that its experts needed to review all available evidence to date.
In a press briefing, the WHO Director-General, Mr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said a paper published last week in the Lancet showed that people taking hydroxychloroquine were at higher risk of death and heart problems.
“There would be a temporary pause on the hydroxychloroquine arm of its global clinical trial,” he said.
GNA