The chief of the Food and Drug Administration defended President Trump for suggesting the possibility of injecting disinfectants into the body to treat the coronavirus.
“I believe the president was asking a question that many Americans are asking, which is, ‘OK, this is what kills the virus, it’s a physical agent, in this case UV light. How could that be applied to kill the virus in, for example, a human being?'” FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn said during a CNN town hall on Thursday.
“We have plenty of examples in medicine where light therapy has been used for treatment of certain diseases,” Hahn added. “So, it’s a natural question that I, as a doctor, would have expected to hear from someone as a natural extension of the data that were presented.”
Earlier in the day, at the White House coronavirus task force briefing, William Bryan, the head of science at the Department of Homeland Security, told reporters that his team has been working to see whether sunlight and disinfectants are capable of combating the virus, after which the president offered some feedback that has prompted pushback and health warnings.
“So, supposing we hit the body with tremendous, I don’t know if it’s ultraviolet or very powerful light, and I think you said that hasn’t been checked, but you’re going to test it,” Trump said, turning to Bryan at the end for confirmation. “Then I said, ‘Suppose you brought the light inside of the body,’ which you could do either through the skin or in some other way, and I think you said you were going to test that, too. Sounds interesting.”
Trump shifted to the idea of using disinfectants as treatment, adding, “Then, I see the disinfectant — one minute. Is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside, or almost a cleaning? Because you see, it gets in the lungs, and it does a tremendous number on the lungs. So, it’d be interesting to check that so that you’ll have to use medical doctors with. But it sounds interesting to me.”
CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked Hahn if he was worried about people taking the president’s comments as fact and ingesting disinfectant.
“Yes, I think it’s an excellent point you’re making. We certainly wouldn’t want, as a physician, someone to take matters in their own hands. I think this is something that a patient would want to talk to their physician about. And no, I certainly wouldn’t recommend the internal ingestion of a disinfectant,” the FDA chief answered. “Again, this is a conversation that occurs every day in America between a patient and a doctor. I’ve been in that position. I’m sure Dr. Gupta has as well. And it’s really important that we address them because people will ask those questions of us.”
The president, after facing backlash for his comments, claimed on Friday he made the comments “sarcastically.” The White House released a statement accusing the media of taking his remarks “out of context.”
