By Elizabeth Lee Vliet, M.D. – https://vivelifecenter.com/
Stunning positive news on hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) was released in early July, potentially opening up medical freedom at the time of America’s celebration of our Declaration of Independence from British tyranny 244 years ago.
During the first six days of July, SIX positive clinical studies of HCQ were released:
- three from the United States (one from Michigan at Henry Ford Health System, and two from New York state, including one primary care outpatient study by Dr. Vladimir Zelenko
- three from other countries (Portugal, India, and Brazil).
All six studies showed that HCQ given early in COVID-19, alone or with zinc and azithromycin, reduces hospitalizations and deaths, with no serious heart or other adverse events.
Most media ignored these six positive studies, continuing to focus on fearmongering about HCQ “dangers” from now discredited, poorly designed and seriously flawed reports on use in critically ill hospitalized patients.
The Henry Ford study showed a 50 percent reduction in the death rate when HCQ was used early in hospitalized COVID patients. Dr. Zelenko’s even earlier outpatient intervention with HCQ, azithromycin and zinc showed approximately 80% decrease in deaths. These extraordinary results show how many lives can be saved with early HCQ treatment.
Henry Ford physicians, researchers, and ethicists have filed an urgent application with FDA Commissioner Dr. Hahn for a new Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for early, out-patient HCQ use in COVID-19.
Baylor Scott & White Heart and Vascular Institute in Dallas issued an urgent letter in support of the Henry Ford new outpatient EUA application, based on the remarkably positive outcomes in their own clinical study of prophylactic use of HCQ in their own medical workers.
Baylor’s letter, from one of their cardiologists, showed benefit for a weekly prophylaxis regimen, and described no adverse cardiac outcomes. This directly rebuts the constant media hype about “heart dangers” of HCQ.
Baylor’s report of prophylactic benefits is profoundly important, not only for front-line medical workers, but also for law enforcement officers, paramedics, dentists/dental hygienists, truck drivers, food-processing workers, clergy, behavioral health professionals, factory and grocery store workers, essential distribution centers, and many others.
These respected institutions add further credibility to my Apr 10 letter to President Trump, which was signed by 1,305 physicians, medical workers, and concerned patients asking for this new EUA.
Henry Ford and Baylor studies add safety data to that accumulated since HCQ was first FDA-approved in 1955, as well as safety reported in 2020 COVID-19 worldwide clinical outcomes, and the safety summaries of HCQ compared to current over-the-counter medicines presented to the Trump Administration May 25.
Americans urgently need to see this new and encouraging information to help relieve anxiety and fear about coronavirus. The mainstream media is still suppressing such information, which can both save lives and help America reopen safely.
Since it was approved more than 65 years ago for malaria, and later for lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, HCQ has been safely used worldwide in hundreds of millions of patients. More than 15 years ago, in the 2002-2003 SARS-CoV-1 outbreak, CDC conducted in-vitro studies that showed HCQ was a potent anti-viral agent. Since the SARS-CoV-2 virus, initially recognized in China, has been spreading around the world, HCQ has been widely used in dozens of countries as a safe and effective treatment for the novel coronavirus causing COVID-19.
In all reports, including the CDC findings published in 2005, HCQ’s most important effect is to block viral entry into the cells and viral replication IF given within the first 5 days of symptoms. Restricting HCQ use to only critically ill hospitalized patients has been one of the reasons for the high U.S. COVID death rate compared to countries using it prophylactically and early in the viral illness. ALL viral illness we treat respond best to anti-viral medication begun early, not late when patients are critically ill.
The U.S. situation is out of control, with people dying and businesses shut down because of FDA roadblocks and governors’ restrictive orders illegally overriding normal FDA regulations that allow physicians to prescribe ANY FDA-approved medication (including HCQ) however they deem medically appropriate. Physicians in many states also face threats of investigation by their state medical boards for prescribing HCQ for COVID-19, and state pharmacy boards direct pharmacists to refuse to dispense HCQ for COVID patients. Such political interference with doctors’ ability to treat patients has never happened before in my medical career.
At some point, the Trump Administration has to take charge of this interference with effective medical treatment that is costing lives, and rein in the FDA and the state-by-state bureaucratic HCQ restrictions.
We need a massive grassroots effort to speak up on the FDA and White House websites in support of this new EUA Application from Henry Ford and Baylor physicians. We must push for White House officials to see the urgency we physicians, patients, and our country are facing.
Our health, our freedom, and our very lives are all at stake.
Author/Contributor short bio:
- Dr. Vliet has been a leader in patient centered, individualized medical care. Since 1986, she has practiced medicine independent of insurance contracts that interfere with patient-physician relationships and decision-making. Dr. Vliet focus is medical freedom and free market approaches to healthcare. Dr. Vliet is the founder of Vive Life Center and Hormone Health Strategies with medical practices in Tucson AZ and Dallas TX, specializing in preventive and climacteric medicine with an integrated approach to evaluation and treatment of women and men with complex medical and hormonal problems from puberty to late life.
- Dr. Vliet is a 2014 Ellis Island Medal of Honor recipient for her national and international educational efforts in health, wellness, and endocrine aging in men and women, and is recognized in the US as a motivational speaker in health and wellness and a powerful patient advocate, proponent of free market approaches to lower healthcare costs. Dr. Vliet is the recipient of Voice of Women Award from Arizona Foundation for Women in recognition of her pioneering advocacy for the overlooked hormone connections in women’s health.
- Dr. Vliet’s consumer health books include: It’s My Ovaries, Stupid; Screaming To Be Heard: Hormonal Connections Women Suspect– And Doctors STILL Ignore; Women, Weight and Hormones; The Savvy Woman’s Guide to PCOS, The Savvy Woman’s Guide to Great Sex, Strength, and Stamina.
- Dr. Vliet is a past Director of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), a member of the AAPS Editorial Writing Team on healthcare reform, and a member of International Menopause Society and the International Society for The Study of the Aging Male (ISSAM). She received her M.D. degree and internship in Internal Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School, and completed specialty training at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She earned her B.S. and Master’s degrees from the College of William and Mary in Virginia.
- Dr. Vliet has appeared on FOX NEWS, Cavuto, Stuart Varney Show, Fox and Friends, Sean Hannity and many nationally syndicated radio shows across the country as well as presented hundreds of Healthcare Town Halls addressing the economic and medical impact of the 2010 healthcare law and free market reforms, as well as seminars and radio shows on healthcare reform, Men’s Health and Women’s Health.
- Dr. Vliet speaks as an independent physician, not as an official spokesperson for any organization or political party. Dr. Vliet has no financial ties to any health care system or health insurance plan. Her allegiance and advocacy is to and for patients.
