French infectious disease doctor Digné Raoult claimed that hydroxychloroquine could treat severe symptoms COVID-19again under the scrutiny of scientists.

Raul, who left his post at the Institut Hospitalo-Universitaire (IHU) Méditerranée Infection, a research hospital, in September 2022, recently published a scientific study that has not yet been peer-reviewed. It claims that 30,423 patients with Covid-19 who were prescribed the famous “Raoult protocol” combining hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and azithromycin (AZ) between March 2, 2020 and December 31, 2021 had a decrease in mortality.

The new study has raised strong doubts in the scientific community. Among the most serious allegations was an article by learned societies and personalities such as Alain Fischer, president of the French Academy of Sciences. An article published in the Le Monde newspaper directly calls into question the protocol and method of treatment. For the signatories, this study is “the largest known unapproved clinical trial to date,” a claim Raoul called “stupid.”

It’s not the first time the French expert’s scientific methods have provoked a reaction. In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, in a study published by The Lancet, its authors observed high mortality rates in patients treated with this combination of substances.

“I don’t know if hydroxychloroquine kills somewhere else, but here it has saved a lot of people,” Raul said.

He also vehemently rejected the hypothesis that this treatment causes serious cardiac arrhythmias, arguing that no such phenomenon was observed in Marseille, despite performing “10,000 electrocardiograms.”

According to Le Monde