Coronavirus: Trump Requests PM Modi To Release Hydroxychloroquine Ordered By US

India's Directorate General of Foreign Trade on March 25 banned the export of Hydroxychloroquine but said that certain shipments on humanitarian grounds may be allowed on a case-by-case basis.

Ahmedabad: President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. AP/PTI

New Delhi: US President Donald Trump has requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi for hydroxychloroquine, a medicine in short supply that could help with facing the Covid-19 pandemic. He said that he called Modi on Saturday morning and told him: "I'd appreciate if they would release the amounts that we ordered and they are giving it serious consideration." "I called Prime Minister Modi of India this morning. They make large amounts of Hydroxychloroquine. India is giving it a serious consideration," Trump said at his daily news conference at the White House on Saturday. India's Directorate General of Foreign Trade on March 25 banned the export of Hydroxychloroquine but said that certain shipments on humanitarian grounds may be allowed on a case-by-case basis. With more than three lakh confirmed cases of coronavirus infection and over 8,000 fatalities, the US has emerged as the worst sufferers of the deadly coronavirus diseases to which there has been no cure. Scientists across the world in particular in the US are racing against time to find either a vaccine or a therapeutic cure to the virus that has so far killed more than 64,000 people and infected 1.2 million in more than 150 countries. Watch:  Based on some initial results, the Trump administration is banking heavily on using Hydroxychloroquine, a decades old malaria drug, for the successful treatment of coronavirus. About India's ban on its export, Trump said, "They hold (the medicine) because they have 1.5 billion people." Trump, who has been promoting the use of hydroxychloroquine as a preventive and a therapeutic drug for Covid-19, said that he might try it himself. "I may take it, and I may have to ask my doctors about that," he said. There has been a run on the medicine in the US because of the reports of its efficacy against coronavirus. The Trump administration has made Hydroxychloroquine as part of its Strategic National Stockpile. Trump said that people in malaria affected-countries take Hydroxychloroquine and not many people are infected by coronavirus. Trump said that he would take Hydroxychloroquine, if needed. (inputs from agencies)