Chloroquine

"At this point the inspections of the previous management of the Ministry of Health found numerous violations and flagrant cases of one-person decision-making for the conclusion of multimillion-dollar contracts by Deputy Minister Zheni Nacheva." This was announced by caretaker Deputy Minister of Health Dimitar Petrov in the studio of "Bulgaria in the Morning".

Testing of the malaria drug as a possible treatment for coronavirus has been halted because of safety fears, the World Health Organization (WHO) says.

Trials in several countries are being "temporarily" suspended as a precaution, the agency said on Monday.

It comes after a recent medical study suggested the drug could increase the risk of patients dying from Covid-19.

The World Health Organization said on May 25 it had temporarily suspended clinical trials of hydroxychloroquine as a potential treatment for COVID-19 being carried out across a range of countries as a precautionary measure.    

The company "Bul Bio" is ready to distribute the medicine chloroquine and this starts today across the country.

Turkey has employed a model that has proved to be very effective in the treatment of COVID-19 patients, the country's health minister has said.

The ability to make fast and smart changes to the treatment protocol is the key to the success to the Turkish model, Fahrettin Koca suggested.

Plans for a gradual easing of measures to contain Covid-19 will also reportedly hinge on the effort to procure about a million diagnostic tests, essential for shielding the public from a second wave of the virus in the autumn. To this end, the government is scouring the international market for test kits.

Bulgaria will start the production of the medications chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine known for treatment of malaria. There has been medical evidence that they give good results in the treatment of COVID-19. The technology has already been mastered. The components needed for the production have already been ordered. The first 5,000 packages of the drugs will be available by April 20.

Health officials in Cyprus were perturbed over an incident when a self-quarantined man infected with the Covid-19 disease went out to local pharmacies in search of chloroquine, an existing drug that is still open to debate around the world.

Greek pharmaceutical company Uni-pharma SA on Friday announced that it has launched production of the medicine Unikinon, which has recently been cited as a possible drug for the treatment of Covid-19, after receiving a shipment of five tons of chloroquine from India the previous Saturday.

Turkey's health minister said on March 24 that the country is using a drug sent from China on patients suffering from the novel coronavirus.     

"From this morning we have brought a special drug used in China which is claimed to have resulted in improvements in intensive care patients, cutting their time in care from 11-12 days to four days," Fahrettin Koca told reporters.