The COVID-19 has taken the world by thunderstorms. With millions of cases every day, the Covid-19 can be considered as one of the deadliest pandemics.
The deaths sore high and lakhs of people being affected with the virus, Remdesvir comes to our rescue.
What is Remdesvir?
Remdesvir is an anti-viral-drug that is basically classified as a nucleotide analog prodrug. A nucleotide analog prodrug prevents replication of the virus thereby prohibiting the rapid multiplication of the virus.
The scientists started working on remdesvir in 2009 and went on studying its benefits with regard to curing several respiratory diseases.
Remdesvir was used as the medication to treat ebola and the drug had limited benefits with regard to ebola. It was the world’s only hope during the sudden breakout of the ebola virus.
Can Remdesvir can be used as a treatment for Coronavirus?
The drug was studied and developed to treat Hepatitis B and some respiratory diseases in 2009 by Gilead Sciences Inc. Remdesvir was the first drug that was recommended to cure ebola.
However, it failed as two other drugs were developed against the ebola virus. Remdesvir has been previously studied with regard to viruses that cause SARS and MERS. However, the study was abandoned due to no cases of SARS at the time.
Now, there are reports that Remdesvir can potentially be a promising treatment for Covid19.
In a recent study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine has discovered that in the initial phase, Remdesivir has shown promising results in treating Covid-19.
The study was conducted on a large group of patients infected with COVID-19 who required oxygen therapy. It was later discovered that the patients who were administered Remdesivir recovered quicker than the ones who were not.
When China hinted on the outbreak of Covid-19 early in January, the Gilead sciences Inc sent the drug to the Chinese center for further studies.
The drug is said to inhibit the multiplication of the virus and treat Covid-19 to some extent especially if the symptoms are mild to moderate. The drug has also shown to reduce the mortality rate and has increased the recovery rate.
The patients who used remdesvir are said to have been recovered from the diseases in 8-10 days. The trials of using Remdesvir as the cure for Covid-19 have begun.
However, the results seem preliminary rather than very promising according to the experts.
The drug has the ability to improve the outcome of Covid-19. However, it is said that combined treatment might work better against the virus. One study has combined Remdesivir with Baricitinib, an anti-inflammatory drug.
Remdesivir would target the replication of the virus whereas Baricitinib would try to quell the body’s immune response. The immune response is said to be responsible for some of the damage to the organs that occur when diagnosed with Covid-19.
The recovery still is not expected to be more than 10-15%. Remdesvir can be a preliminary drug rather than a possible treatment as there is still no firm evidence with regard to the drug being the cure.
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