Question reference: S5W-28751
- Asked by: Brian Whittle, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
- Date lodged: 27 April 2020
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Current status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 18 May 2020
Question
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the drug being tested as a possible treatment for COVID-19, what steps it is taking to ensure that there are adequate supplies of hydroxychloroquine to treat people with rheumatoid disease, and whether it can offer a similar assurance to that given by NHS England that it will maintain supplies for its service users.
Answer
Access to medicines should not be affected by the current COVID-19 global pandemic. There are no known supply issues and hydroxychloroquine remains available from manufacturers for community pharmacies to order through wholesalers.
There are a number of established clinical trials to explore whether a number of medicines, including hydroxychloroquine, may provide a potential treatment for COVID-19. Public Health England has secured relatively large volumes of hydroxychloroquine specifically for any NHS clinical trials across the UK, including Scotland, and the NHS has been advised to order through established supply routes so that prescription supplies are not affected.
The Medicines Healthcare and products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has published a reminder that hydroxychloroquine is not licensed to treat COVID-19 related symptoms or prevent infection and that it should only be used for this purpose within a clinical trial. The MHRA has also added hydroxychloroquine to the list of medicines that cannot be parallel exported from the UK in order to protect stock in the country for UK patients.