{"id":65159,"date":"2020-03-24T12:52:25","date_gmt":"2020-03-24T18:52:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/arizona-death-prompts-warning-against-self-medication\/"},"modified":"2020-03-24T18:52:25","modified_gmt":"2020-03-24T18:52:25","slug":"arizona-death-prompts-warning-against-self-medication","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/arizona-death-prompts-warning-against-self-medication\/","title":{"rendered":"Arizona death prompts warning against self-medication"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Parents
Parents of students at Encanto Elementary in Phoenix line up on Monday to get packets of exercises for children to do at home. Like many schools across the nation, schools in Arizona have been ordered closed amid the coronavirus outbreak.<\/span>Peter Prengaman\/Associated Press<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Banner Health said Monday that the couple in their 60s got sick within half an hour of ingesting the additive. The man couldn\u2019t be resuscitated when he arrived at a hospital, but the woman was able to throw up much of the chemical, Banner said.<\/p>\n

Chloroquine is obtained by prescription, and Banner Health is now urging medical providers against prescribing it to people who aren\u2019t hospitalized. The difference between the fish tank cleaning additive that the couple took and the drug used to treat malaria is the way they are formulated.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump kept saying it was basically pretty much a cure,\u201d the woman told NBC. She said her advice for people would be, \u201cDon\u2019t take anything. Don\u2019t believe anything. Don\u2019t believe anything that the president says and his people \u2026 call your doctor.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear if the couple took it specifically because of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, but now Banner Health is warning everyone to avoid self-medicating.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven the uncertainty around COVID-19, we understand that people are trying to find new ways to prevent or treat this virus, but self-medicating is not the way to do so,\u201d said Dr. Daniel Brooks, Banner Poison and Drug Information Center medical director. \u201cThe last thing that we want right now is to inundate our emergency departments with patients who believe they found a vague and risky solution that could potentially jeopardize their health.\u201d<\/p>\n

At a news conference last week, Trump falsely said the Food and Drug Administration had just approved the use of an anti-malaria medication called chloroquine to treat patients infected with coronavirus. Even after the FDA chief clarified that the drug still needs to be tested for that use, Trump overstated the drug\u2019s potential upside in containing the virus.<\/p>\n

The man\u2019s death came as the number of COVID-19 cases in Arizona spiked more than 50% in one day, from 152 on Sunday to 235 on Monday, according to the state Health Department.<\/p>\n

Pima County reported its first coronavirus death: A woman in her 50s with an underlying health condition.<\/p>\n

It marked the third COVID-19 death in Arizona. Two men, one in his 70s and one in his 50s, died previously from the disease. Both had underlying conditions.<\/p>\n

Gov. Doug Ducey said he\u2019s working on an \u201ceconomic protection plan\u201d to help people struggling with the loss of income, but he did not outline details. He said it will be released soon.<\/p>\n

Ducey also answered questions about the role of the National Guard in Arizona, which the governor called on last week. Ducey said the Guard is now involved only in shoring up the supply chain for grocery stores and food banks, but \u201cthey\u2019re going to be flexible.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he\u2019d deploy the Guard as needed but sidestepped a question about whether the soldiers would be involved in law enforcement.<\/p>\n

About 100 National Guard soldiers received briefings Monday from medical, legal, public affairs and others staff members, Major Aaron Thacker said. All were given a basic medical screening to check for a fever, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re preparing for the mission,\u201d Thacker said. \u201cI\u2019m anticipating in the next couple of days you\u2019re going to see a large volume of guardsmen crossing across the state in order to support the needs of the food banks.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Guard expects to mobilize more than 700 people this week, but it wasn\u2019t clear exactly when they would hit the streets, and many more could be expected.<\/p>\n

Ducey anticipates the response to the virus will include up to 5,500 Arizona National Guard personnel, he wrote Friday in a letter to U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper requesting federal money and additional authority. That would represent the majority of the Guard\u2019s 7,600 members. Ducey said the state needs immediate help in several areas including planning, consulting, logistics and supplies, testing and personnel movement.<\/p>\n

People have tested positive in 11 of Arizona\u2019s 15 counties, including 139 cases in Maricopa County, the state\u2019s most populous.<\/p>\n

For most people, the virus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, older adults and people with health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia.<\/p>\n

The vast majority of people recover from the virus.<\/p>\n

Dr. Cara Christ, Arizona\u2019s top health official, said the state is preparing for surging demand on hospitals. She said possibilities include building three field hospitals and reopening shuttered medical centers, and using a former basketball arena to house patients leaving the hospital but not yet well enough to go home.<\/p>\n

Ducey issued an executive order outlining \u201cessential services\u201d that can continue to operate if the state or any local government issues an order for people to stay home. The essential services include health care, food suppliers, gas stations, banks, hardware stores, laundromats, home repair and infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Ducey said he\u2019s preparing for the future but there\u2019s no need currently for a stay-at-home order like those issued in several U.S. cities and states, including California and New York.<\/p>\n

\u201cArizona is not there yet,\u201d Ducey said. \u201cWe\u2019re not at the same stage as other states.\u201d<\/p>\n

Associated Press reporters Terry Tang and Bob Christie contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Parents of students at Encanto Elementary in Phoenix line up on Monday to get packets of exercises for children to do at home. Like many schools across the nation, schools in Arizona have been ordered closed amid the coronavirus outbreak.Peter Prengaman\/Associated Press Banner Health said Monday that the couple in their 60s got sick within […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":65160,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[685,1137,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-65159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-coronavirus-covid-19","tag-donald-trump","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65159"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=65159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}