Hospitals are seeing early success giving hydroxychloroquine to patients with COVID-19. Now, Henry Ford Health System wants to see if the drug can prevent the virus.
The health system and the city of Detroit are launching the first research trial in the nation in which healthy people are given hydroxychloroquine. It plans to enroll 3,000 first responders and health care workers from southeast Michigan in the eight-week trial.
The goal is to see if the drug can prevent or weaken COVID-19, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan said.
"In Detroit, we don't normally take things lying down. We fight back," Duggan said. "If this study works out, we'll save the lives of first responders around the world."
Enrollment is voluntary for any first responders or health care workers in southeast Michigan who don't have COVID-19 or related symptoms.