Sen. Kamala Harris took aim at President Trump for promoting the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine during his coronavirus press conferences.
“The president keeps taking the stage and as opposed to what Dr. [Anthony] Fauci and medical health professionals are telling us, pushing this drug,” the California Democrat said Wednesday on The View. “He’s got to stop — he’s not — we don’t want a drug pusher for president.”
Trump has promoted the drug, which some doctors have said has helped fight the coronavirus in hospitals. White House coronavirus task force member Fauci, however, has cautioned that people should not put all their faith in hydroxychloroquine as the “knockout drug.”
“We still need to do the definitive studies to determine whether any intervention, not just this one, is truly safe and effective,” Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Friday. “But when you don’t have that information, it’s understandable why people might want to take something anyway even with the slightest hint of being effective.”
Democrats have pounced on Trump for promoting the drug for coronavirus patients. One Democratic lawmaker even threatened to refer the president to the International Court of Justice for touting it.
