| In the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, doctors and scientists worldwide were desperate to lay their hands on a drug that could treat Covid-19. Naturally, the first prospects for possible treatments were medicines that had worked on other viruses. One in particular looked promising: chloroquine (and its cousin, hydroxychloroquine). A perfectly rational place to start, right? But as Adam Rogers writes this week on Backchannel, that's when things got … weird. The story of hydroxychloroquine encapsulates a larger struggle of modern life: How do you know—with scientific certainty—whether something is true? In the case of this drug, whether it is effective against a given virus and whether prescribing it on a massive scale is safe? As Rogers writes, "'Does it work?' is a harder question to answer than it sounds." Especially in the middle of a raging pandemic. Especially when the president of the world's richest country tends to take policy advice from people who don't necessarily have any expertise (in this case, reportedly, Oracle chairman Larry Ellison, among others). And especially when a chorus of entrepreneurs and assorted hucksters are pursuing their own agendas. Like Rogers says: harder than it sounds. Mark Robinson | Features Editor, WIRED | 
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