French inquiry censures lab that promoted hydroxychloroquine to treat Covid
Report raises awkward questions about prominent study on antimalarial conducted in Didier Raoult’s lab
A probe instigated by the French health ministry has found ‘serious malfunctions’ in the laboratory of Didier Raoult, a microbiologist who rose to prominence after suggesting hydroxychloroquine could treat for Covid-19.
Based on Raoult’s small March 2020 study, the then US President Donald Trump repeatedly endorsed hydroxychloroquine, a decades-old cheap malaria drug as a treatment for Covid-19. The study soon came under scrutiny when the International Society of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, which runs the journal that published the study, distanced itself from it.