Mutagenic, Genotoxic and Immunomodulatory effects of Hydroxychloroquine and Chloroquine: a review to evaluate its potential to use as a prophylactic drug against COVID-19 | Genes and Environment | Full Text

Mutagenic, Genotoxic and Immunomodulatory effects of Hydroxychloroquine and Chloroquine: a review to evaluate its potential to use as a prophylactic drug against COVID-19 | Genes and Environment | Full Text

[Pick Up]Mutagenic, Genotoxic and Immunomodulatory Effects of Hydroxychloroquine and Chloroquine: a review to evaluate its potential to use as a prophylactic drug against COVID-19

Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and Chloroquine (CQ) are two anti-malarial drugs that are now being extensively used by healthcare workers and common people as a prophylactic drug against the Corona Virus Disease -19 (COVID-19) in several parts of the world. There are no clinical studies that have established any clinical efficacy of these drugs as a prophylactic against COVID-19. In this review, the authors elucidated the mechanism of immunomodulation by both HCQ and CQ and highlighted the mutagenic and genotoxic effects from the available literature. This article is written with the sole objective that the reader will be able to recognize the adverse effects of these drugs when consumed by healthy individuals as a prophylactic. Current evidence cumulatively demonstrates that CQ is a mutagenic and genotoxic drug and both HCQ and CQ are not effective against the COVID-19 infection either as post-exposure prophylaxis or as a curative drug. The authors concluded that healthy individuals should refrain from the use of these drugs as prophylactics until further investigation.

Read this article: Volume 41, Article number: 25 (2020)