The hydroxychloroquine alliance: how far-right leaders and alt-science preachers came together to promote a miracle drug

Abstract

Soon after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the world saw far-right leaders uniting to promote hydroxychloroquine despite controversial results. Why have some leaders actively promoted the drug since then, contradicting recommendations made by their own government’s health authorities? Our argument is twofold. First, hydroxychloroquine has been an integral tool of medical populist performance in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. We adopt Lasco & Curato’s (2018) definition of medical populism as a political style based on performances of public health crises that pit ‘the people’ against ‘the establishment’ using alternative knowledge claims to cast doubt on the credibility of doctors, scientists, and technocrats. Second, rather than being an individual endeavor, medical populism addressing the coronavirus crisis has led populists to build an alt-science network. We define it as a loose movement of alleged truth-seekers who publicly advance scientific claims at a crossroads between partial evidence, pseudo-science, and conspiracy theories. It comprises scientists, businesspeople and celebrities united by their distrust of governments and mainstream science. In this article, we look at how the hydroxychloroquine alliance was formed, as well as its political and policy implications. To this end, we compare why and how Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro have appealed to medical populist performances when addressing the health crisis. By mobilizing the concepts of medical populism and alt-science, this paper aims to contribute to the scholarship on the relationship between populist politics and policy-making.

Pharmaceutical messianism and the COVID-19 pandemic

“…countries either adopting a cure already in use elsewhere or influencing other countries to adopt the same). Raoult pushed for hydroxychloroquine based on new data from China, but the drug's popularity in France also bolstered its subsequent use in countries like the United States and Brazil ( Casarões and Magalhães, 2021 ). Ivermectin in the Philippines was clearly legitimized from the outside-in, the drug already a COVID-19 ‘cure’ in many countries by then, while the opposite held true for Covid-Organics, which was quickly embraced by Madagascar's African neighbors.…”

“…Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, one common response among world leaders and politicians has been to promote pharmaceuticals and other substances that can supposedly treat or prevent the viral disease—from hydroxychloroquine ( Casarões and Magalhães, 2021 ) to ivermectin ( Turkia, 2021 ); from herbal remedies in Madagascar and Venezuela ( Moleiro, 2021 ; Nordling, 2020 ) to cow dung and urine in India ( RFI, 2021 ). Scholars have identified these promises of a ‘miracle cure’ or ‘wonder drug’ as part of the ‘simplification of the pandemic’ that constitutes the ‘medical populism’ of political actors ( Lasco, 2020 ).…”

YouTube as a source of information about unproven drugs for Covid-19: The role of the mainstream media and recommendation algorithms in promoting misinformation

“…Bolsonaro and his supporters have also regularly promoted unproven drugs to fight Covid-19 14 . In particular, they claimed that hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine should be used as treatment and prophylaxis for Covid-19, which reverberated on social media (Araujo & Oliveira, 2020;Recuero et al, 2021;Casarões & Magalhães, 2021).…”

“…In this study, we look at YouTube videos about hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine in Brazil. Although these drugs are not recommended as a treatment or prophylaxis for Covid-19 6 , Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and many of his supporters have been promoting hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine as a "cure" and prophylaxis for Covid-19 (Araujo & Oliveira, 2020;Soares et al, 2020;Casarões & Magalhães, 2021). Therefore, we aim to analyze videos about hydroxy/chloroquine on YouTube, in particular, videos that reproduce content promoting the drugs; and explore how YouTube's recommendation algorithm might contribute to the emergence of echo chambers.…”

The promising drugs included in WHO’s Solidarity Project: a choice based in scientific knowledge and institutional competencies

“…As for the current pandemic, many studies have investigated the endorsement of hydroxychloroquine by far-right leaders. Casarões & Magalhães, (28) for instance, discuss such endorsement with a theoretical background based in the concept of medical populism, a common style incorporated by political authorities during a health emergency.…”