Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer stepped out of her lane warning doctors about prescribing anti-malaria drug Hydroxychloroquine and Asithromycin [Z-Pak] to treat coronavirus AKA CoV-2 or Covid-19 in Michigan. No elected official can tell licensed physicians what to do with their patients, especially denying them the right to used tried-and-true medications off-label or for other conditions for which the drugs were not approved by the FDA. When 73-year-old President Donald Trump announced March 20 at his daily coronvirus press briefing that Hydroxychoroquine AKA Plaquenil was used effectively in France with azithromycin [Z-Pak] to treat Covid-19, Whitman somehow concluded it was a bad thing. She didn’t mention that Food and Drug Administration [FDA] Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn was at Trump’s side, saying he would fast-track the off-label treatment under “compassionate use” guidelines.
Off-label uses of medications is routinely practiced by the medical community with a wide variety of drugs, including anti-malaria agents like Plaquenil. Plaqeunil has bee prescribed safe-and-effectively for years to treat lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. No governor or elected official can dictate to the medical profession what to do with any FDA-approved medication. Media reports at that same March 20 press conference deliberately distorted the remarks of 80-year-old National Institutes of Health Infectious Disease Director Anthony Fauci who only said he has no corroborating research on safety or effectiveness. Fauci never said it was a bad idea to try something in certain cases without a properly controlled FDA study. University of Michigan and Henry Ford Hospital announced they’d used hydroxychloroquine and Z-Pak to treat coronavirus cases when appropriate.
Receiving s stern warning for Whitmer, the second year 48-year-old governor ordered her Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs to threaten doctors and pharmacists dispensing or prescribing Plaquenil and Z-Pak to treat Covid-19. Whitmer has stepped so far out of line that she needs to be put in her place. Off-label medications are routinely used by the medical community. Whether FDA approved or not, the use of Plaquenil and Z-Paks for treating coronavirus is a perfectly legitimate practice by any physician believing it’s in his patient’s best interest. Warning doctors and pharmacists in a March 24 letter, Michigan’s Licensing Board warned of “administrative action” against licensees who defied the governor’s ban. Doctors and pharmacists don’t answer to governors, they answer to their professional organizations that manage their practices in the best interests of patients.
Whitmer’s stirring up more controversy today claiming that she’s battling Trump to get needed medical supplies to her state. Using the Covid-19 crisis as a political stunt, Whitmer hopes to use CNN to whip up utter nonsense to hurt Trump politically in Michigan, promising to be a pivotal battleground state in the 2020 election. Whitmer’s now screaming that her beef with Trump has prevented her state from getting vital medical supplies to fight the growing Covid-19 epidemic. Michigan has 3,657 cases with 92 deaths or a mortality rate of 2.5%, one percent above the national average. If anyone needs additional treatments, it’s Michigan, where some critically ill patients need FDA’s “right to try” guidelines, not a governor’s arbitrary- and-capricious whims. Whitmer knows that physicians around the country have been prescribing Plaquenil and Z-Paks to themselves and their families.
Elected officials need to stay in the lanes, not veer into conventional practices of physicians and pharmacists. Even if Whitmer, for whatever reason, held strong opinions, it’s inappropriate for her to manipulate state licensing boards to fit her eccentricities, especially when it comes to public health. Her intervention with Michigan’s State Medical Board warrants her removal from office. With such poor judgment, it’s just a matter of time before she commits another egregious act that harms Michigan residents. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo bought 70,000 doses of Plaquenil, 10,000 does or Zithromycin and 75,000 does of chroloquin, all to be used to save lives in New York. Whitmer’s blatent attempt to use the power of her office to intimidate doctors and pharmacists requires immediate action by the Democrat legislature, something, for partisan reasons, won’t happen.
Whitmer’s interference in Michigan over the practice of medicine and pharmacy warrants immediate removal from office. She played politics with something Trump recommended and it backfired on her. Cuomo wouldn’t stockpile hydroxychlorquine, Z-Paks or chloroquine if he thought it would harm New York residents infected with coronavirus. All elected officials have personal opinions that don’t belong foisted on the public. Whitmer went beyond her personal opinion, allowing the Democrat Party to use her to attack Trump. It goes beyond the pale that she interfered in her medical and pharamacy state licensing boards to threaten doctors and pharmacists for doing their jobs under their professional guidelines. It they listened to Whitmer, they’d be guilty of malpractice, not allowing patients suffering with coronavirus the right to treatments currently available to save lives.
