New York/London - An influential medical
journal article that found hydroxychloroquine increased the risk
of death in Covid-19 patients was retracted on Thursday, adding
to controversy around a drug championed by US President Donald
Trump.
Three of the authors of the article retracted it, citing
concerns about the quality and veracity of data in the study.
The anti-malarial drug has been controversial in part due to
support from Trump, as well as implications of the study
published in British journal The Lancet last month, which led
several Covid-19 studies to be halted.
The three authors said Surgisphere, the company that
provided the data, would not transfer the dataset for an
independent review and they "can no longer vouch for the
veracity of the primary data sources."
The fourth author of the study, Dr. Sapan Desai, chief
executive of Surgisphere, declined to comment on the retraction.
"When you have reputable journals that put this kind of work
out and are retracted 10 days later, it just increases
mistrust," said Dr. Walid Gellad, a professor at University of
Pittsburgh's medical school.
The Lancet said on Thursday it "takes issues of scientific
integrity extremely seriously, and there are many outstanding
questions about Surgisphere and the data that were allegedly
included in this study".
It said institutional reviews of Surgisphere's research
collaborations were urgently needed.
Another study in the New England Journal of Medicine that
relied on Surgisphere data and shared the same lead author,
Harvard Medical School Professor Mandeep Mehra, was retracted
for the same reason.
The observational study published in The Lancet on May 22
said it looked at 96 000 hospitalized Covid-19 patients, some
treated with the decades-old malaria drug. It claimed that those
treated with hydroxychloroquine or the related chloroquine had
higher risk of death and heart rhythm problems than patients who
were not given the medicines.
The World Health Organization, which paused
hydroxychloroquine trials after The Lancet study was released,
said on Wednesday it was ready to resume trials, and dozens of
other trials have resumed or are in process.
"I did not do enough to ensure that the data source was
appropriate for this use," the study's lead author, Professor
Mehra, said in a statement. "For that, and for all the
disruptions – both directly and indirectly – I am truly sorry."
Many scientists voiced concern about the study, which had
already been corrected last week because some location data was
wrong. Nearly 150 doctors signed an open letter to The Lancet
calling the article's conclusions into question and asking to
make public the peer review comments that preceded publication.
The episode highlights how studies to prevent and treat the
virus are being conducted at unprecedented speed while garnering
high levels of attention that could give findings unwarranted
weight.