The debate over hydroxychloroquine's use amid the global coronavirus pandemic is being blown out or proportion, perhaps over political opportunism, according to Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, to Newsmax TV.
Dr. Burgess, a medical doctor before being a congressman, told Monday's "Spicer & Co." he has taken the drug before going to malaria-hit areas to protect himself, but he admitted one of the side effects is depression.
American soldiers would choose not to take it going into malaria-hit areas because of the depression side effect, Dr. Burgess added.
"That's why it's called both an art and a science of practicing medicine," Burgess told host Sean Spicer. "An off-label use of an FDA-approved medicine is not an unusual situation."
Burgess said some kind of in-action trials need to be conducted very quickly, even if well short of double-blind clinical studies.
"We need studies that report the efficacy of the drug," he said.
As for other pandemic topics applying to Burgess' Texas district, he called it a "circuitous" dilemma of permitting foreign agricultural workers into our country if we are asking our own American workers to stay home.
And, amid the oil debate worldwide, Burgess lamented the coronavirus stimulus package did not permit the Trump administration to stock up on the U.S. oil reserves when the price of the commodity has hit unexpected lows.
"It's the old Economics 101: Buy low, sell high," Burgess concluded. "Now it's low and we're not buying, and that makes no sense."
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Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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