Axios issued a story correction and deleted a tweet suggesting President Donald Trump’s call to explore an anti-malaria drug as a coronavirus treatment caused people to ingest fish-tank cleaner
The issue arose after a man died and his wife was put in critical condition in Arizona after ingesting cleaner with chloroquine phosphate as an ingredient, the same drug commonly used to fight malaria. Axios and other outlets connected the incident to Trump’s calls for the U.S. to explore the drug as a coronavirus treatment, which France is already doing. (RELATED: VP Pence And Wife Test Negative For Coronavirus)
We have deleted this tweet and corrected our story because it did not reflect the full nature of the self-medication done with an additive commonly used to clean fish tanks. https://t.co/0zucqRaIkI pic.twitter.com/3YY86rju2w
— Axios (@axios) March 24, 2020
The wife of the man who died said they used the drug because they heard Trump recommend it. Trump never encouraged people to self-medicate with the drug, however. (RELATED: Germany Bans Meetings Of More Than Two People)
President Donald Trump directed Federal Drug Administration commissioner Stephen Hahn to waive “outdated rules and bureaucracies” on the testing of various “anti-viral therapies” to combat coronavirus last week.
“It’s shown very encouraging early results, and we’re going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately,” Trump said of chloroquine when prescribed. “And that’s where the FDA has been so great.”