The Privilege of Trying Out Hydroxychloroquine

I subscribe to Wired Magazine. To be honest, I haven’t fully read many issues so far. It seems like I skim an article or two, and all of sudden 4 weeks have passed and there's another one in my mailbox.

This month, however, I surprised myself and got hooked by two powerful articles. One was titled, The Strange and Twisted Tale of Hydroxychloroquine, and the other was called, What Writing a Pandemic Newsletter Showed Me About America. (I’m going to focus on that first one today!)

In The Strange and Twisted Tale, I was seriously intrigued by the science surrounding hydroxychloroquine and its uses. A few random facts I picked up:

1. It was originally derived from the bark of a tree, and the first people to use it medicinally were indigenous Peruvians.
2. Early attempts to synthesize quinine (the active ingredient) failed but did result in the first-ever synthetic pigment.
3. During WWII the US wasn’t able to access the drug form (chloroquine) because it was produced by Bayer (German-owned), so we obtained the recipe from German POWs.
4. No drug companies hold a patent on it, because it is so old.

Photo by Myriam Zilles on Unsplash

[Image Description: A blue and white medical mask is draped over a black and silver stethoscope, a needle, and multiple blood vials. The counter surface and background are white.]

This is also the drug that was waved around as the possible antidote to Covid-19, taken on a widespread level globally with no real scientific proof it did anything, championed by the US president (who didn’t end up using it himself when he actually had Covid), and was ultimately debunked when ongoing testing showed it did nothing. (And surprise! The reason it had originally been thought to work in a petri dish was because it had been tested using kidney samples. When retested in the lab using lung tissue, it was not shown to be effective. But by that point we had already “tested” it on humans and figured out it didn’t work.)

I highly recommend giving this article a read BEFORE we get hit with another round of promises and vaccine talk; it’s very helpful to understand how it all went down the first time, and definitely opened my eyes to things to watch out for in the upcoming months.

The author, Adam Rogers, also noted the inherent privilege of being able to take a drug like hydroxychloroquine “just to see if it works”.

You need the ability to go to a doctor and have your concerns heard so you can get a prescription, and you need the inherent faith that if it doesn’t work (and actually makes things worse), you can get medical care to deal with the fallout.

• If you don’t have insurance…
• Can’t take any more time off work…
• Won’t be able to afford to fill a prescription and/or pursue follow-up care…

Then you don’t have the luxury of trying out untested drugs that may or may not work.

And if you have good insurance, disposable income, the ability to get time off from work (probably even paid leave), transportation, and a willingness to give it a go: welcome aboard!

I was never diagnosed with Covid, and if I had been I would have been able to continue working from home as I have been doing. I also think that if I had wanted to try hydroxychloroquine I could have. My insurance would have covered it, and if I had gotten hospitalized with complications most of that would have been covered too. I don’t consider myself wealthy by any means, but I do have enough margin I could choose to take a risk and play the odds a bit. That is a privilege.

This piece isn’t about assigning blame to that. It’s really just a curious inquiry into how many other people feel that way, as well as who doesn’t.

Maybe people who are…

• Elderly
• Have other health conditions
• Are uninsured
• Work hourly jobs / minimum wage
• Are unemployed
• Are primary caregivers for others
• Hold essential positions in the workforce
• Are living paycheck to paycheck
• Lack transportation

…might be less likely to feel they have the option of trying an experimental cure for Covid-19. And I guess they are why I’m writing this; it’s a way to explore how the experience I’m having is not the experience we are ALL having.

I think for me, that’s at the heart of intersectionality. It’s the understanding the not everyone is having “my” experience. What a joy to get to SEE that, to interact with the reality of it, and to open my own heart to empathy and understanding.

In this particular example, I’m a person of privilege because I have resources and options that not everyone has. That’s an invitation for me to look at systems and structures that have supported me in having options; to identify ways in which I can be part of building bridges for more people to have that same level of access; and to recognize another area of life in which the way I vote, volunteer, and live in my community can either benefit or harm other people who are having a different experience.

That’s what I find powerful about thinking (and hopefully living) intersectionally.

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With I Am Intersectionality, I hope to provide thought-provoking resources that will help us understand more about our own personal intersections, and what those intersections mean in the historical and social moment we are living in today. If you’d like to get an occasional email with articles and resources on intersectionality, sign up here!