Journalist Sharyl Attkisson covers the cancellation of hydroxychloroquine in new book, Follow the Science

Editor’s Note: Below is an exclusive excerpt from investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson’s new book:Follow the Science: How Big Pharma Misleads, Obfuscates, and Wins.” The book, published by Harper Collins, is scheduled for release on Tuesday, September 3.

“If you look at a carefully curated selection of mainstream medical and media narratives, you’ll likely get the impression that the prescription drug that President Trump has touted as a potential game-changer in the fight against coronavirus—hydroxychloroquine—has been thoroughly ‘debunked’ and discredited.

“At the height of the Covid panic, when politics, money and medicine intersected – there were two divergent views on hydroxychloroquine, both of which could not be true at the same time. The first view was negative, widely reported in the press. The second you probably heard less about. Rarely has the discussion about drug choice been so tainted by political overtones…

“Many right-wing media figures and independent scientists have come out in favor of hydroxychloroquine, while the public health service and left-wing press have supported remdesivir, each accusing the other of ignoring real science.

“I found an instructive review by cardiologist Dr. William O’Neill, chief medical officer of Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, Michigan, where researchers studied both remdesivir and hydroxychloroquine and had no known financial interest in the study results.

“In forty years of practice, I have never seen science so politicized,” Dr. O’Neill tells me during our visit.

“’Some people in the media are treating hydroxychloroquine as if it were something that was being promoted by quacks (as if) it was dangerous, debunked and discredited,’ I say to Dr. O’Neill. ‘What do you think?’” …

“I think (the negative media narrative about hydroxychloroquine) is very damaging,” Dr. O’Neill tells me. “President Trump pushed it early on, and then the media decided to debunk it and discredit it without any regard for the science. I think those of us who are actually involved in the scientific enterprise believe that it has some merit and needs to be tested.”

“Dr. O’Neill is a world-renowned leader in interventional cardiology, known for “pioneering research into new techniques for diagnosing and treating heart attacks.” He is not only a distinguished researcher; he is also a clinician.

“When we first spoke, he had already prescribed hydroxychloroquine, before the government restricted its use, to numerous COVID patients. He tells me he has seen improvement in all of them. Real-world evidence, first-hand, directly from a dedicated scientist! On the other hand, he tells me he is much less impressed with remdesivir.

“There’s a lot of hype around (remdesivir),” Dr. O’Neill continues. “I saw the original study in the New England Journal article and I saw the study in the Lancet, and to me, it’s just a big, ‘Ho-hum. I just don’t see much benefit.’” …

“The recurring lesson in science and life in general is that when the actions of the media, government and public officials seem so contrary to common sense: Follow the money. You can learn a lot. So amidst the hydroxychloroquine nonsense, I’m starting to connect the dots…

“I’m looking at a list of names on a government COVID treatment panel that has restricted the use of hydroxychloroquine and promoted the newer, more expensive remdesivir. I want to see if any of them are affiliated with companies that make hydroxychloroquine or remdesivir. Ideally, none of the panel members should have ties to companies that profit from their decisions. But that world no longer exists in public health. The second-best option would be for advisors to recuse themselves from decisions about companies they are affiliated with. But that world doesn’t exist either.

“What do I find? About a third of a government advisory panel on COVID treatments, eleven members, reported ties to a pharmaceutical company. Nine of the eleven mentioned Gilead, the maker of remdesivir! What are the natural odds that so many of the people selected for the COVID expert panel would be affiliated with the company that makes the treatment they ultimately favored?

“I keep digging.

“In addition to these eleven, I identify nine others, including two of the three committee leaders, who also have ties to Gilead but have not disclosed them. Two of them even served on Gilead’s advisory board! Others were paid consultants or received research support and honoraria from Gilead. Technically, they didn’t have to admit to these ties, because under the special rules of the committee, for some reason, panel members don’t have to admit to conflicts of interest older than eleven months. As if conflicts of interest become irrelevant after eleven months?

“I need to find one more piece of the puzzle. How many members of the same advisory panel report having financial ties to remdesivir’s unpopular rival, hydroxychloroquine – a generic drug so cheap that no major pharmaceutical company will make billions if it works for Covid?

Answer: zero.

“When I first spoke with Dr. O’Neill at Henry Ford Hospital, he was confident that good science would prevail and ongoing studies would soon provide definitive answers on the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in treating COVID-19.

“I think it’s still very early in this disease process, where we’re going to learn a lot,” he tells me in late spring 2020. “There are 600 studies being done on Covid in the United States right now, looking at all kinds of different types of infections and combinations. By the end of the summer, we’ll be a lot smarter. So I think what I’d say to everyone is, just hold your gunpowder.”

“Shortly afterward, I learn that Dr. O’Neill’s hydroxychloroquine study has been halted by anonymous higher authorities. In any case, it has become pointless. The FDA’s criticism of hydroxychloroquine has made it impossible to recruit enough volunteers to move the study forward. After all, who in their right mind would raise their hand to participate in a study with a drug that the FDA has so publicly warned against?”

“Now people are afraid to use (hydroxychloroquine) — without any scientifically sound concerns,” Dr. O’Neill tells me when I ask. “We talked to our colleagues at the University of Minnesota who are doing a similar study, and at the University of Washington. We treated four hundred patients and didn’t see a single adverse event. And what’s happening is (that) because of this fake news and fake science, real scientific efforts are being harmed. Because people are so worried now that they don’t want to participate in studies.”

Dr O’Neill later said the “saddest part” of all this was that we would never get a definitive, scientific answer to what had become a political question.

“The government and other allies of the vaccine industry would soon see the same unscientific treatment approach applied to another generic drug that had been reclassified, ‘off-label,’ to treat COVID-19: ivermectin.

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