Big Move? Turkey to start using special drug from China to fight Coronavirus

Turkey's health minister said Monday that the country is using a drug sent from China on patients suffering from the novel coronavirus. He did not give more information on the drug but the anti-malarial drug chloroquine has recently been used to treat coronavirus patients in China as well as France.

"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.

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Some researchers have said chloroquine shows great promise, though scientists have agreed that only more trials would determine if it really works and is safe. According to figures released late Sunday, Turkey has officially recorded 1,236 coronavirus cases and 30 deaths.

Almost 89% cases recovered in China

On March 23, China’s National Health Commission released a report confirming that 89% of all coronavirus cases in China had recovered and had been discharged from hospitals. As per reports, of the 81,093 cases reported in the country since the beginning of the outbreak, as many as 72,000 have recovered and only little more than 5,000 remain in the hospitals.

The reports said, "As of 24:00 on March 22, the National Health Commission had received 81,093 reports of confirmed cases and 3,270 deaths in 31 provincial-level regions on the Chinese mainland and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, and in all 72,703 patients had been cured and discharged from hospital."

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(With agency inputs)