House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has expressed her concerns for “morbidly obese” President Donald Trump after he admitted that he was taking hydroxychloroquine to prevent him from getting coronavirus.
“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 his, shall we say, weight group … morbidly obese, they say,” Pelosi said per CNN.
“A couple of weeks ago, I started taking it,” Trump said, who later said he’d been taking it every day for a week and a half. He also claimed that many frontline workers were also taking the drug.
Medical experts have warned against it, and a study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association which showed that the drug does not fight the deadly virus.
The drug has long been approved to treat malaria, rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. According to the Washington Post, clinical trials, academic research and scientific analysis indicate that the danger of the drug is a significantly increased risk of death for certain patients, particularly those with heart problems.