Hanover. At the end of February, the time had come: For the treatment of coronavirus patients, Chinese authorities approved the American antivirus drug Remdesivir for clinical trials with the new coronavirus. The Chinese news agency Xinhua reported that 761 patients infected with the novel coronavirus started taking the drug.
Meanwhile, there are hopes around the world: The World Health Organization is testing the active ingredient, in Europe the drug agency EMA made a recommendation for its use. And now Germany has also followed suit, where the active ingredient can be used in individual cases in seriously ill patients.
Remdesivir is an active ingredient developed by Gilead Sciences, an American pharmaceutical company. For Cao Bin, head of the clinical study program for the drug in China, it was already clear in February: Remdevisir had shown good results with other coronaviruses such as Sars or Mers and at least at the cell level with the new virus called 2019-nCov. In one patient, remdesivir quickly relieved the symptoms of the disease – in this case, pneumonia.
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Remdisivir has not yet been approved
Remdesivir was not licensed or approved anywhere in the world until shortly before the test. Remdesivir China was provided at the request of attending physicians and with the support of local regulators, who weighed the risks and benefits of providing an experimental drug without data. First for a small number of patients – as emergency treatment without approved treatment options. According to the US pharmaceutical company, the data gave “cause for hope”.
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First success in treatment
Remdesivir was originally developed to treat the Ebola virus, but has been shown to be ineffective. However, an American study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that remdesivir can help treat the coronavirus. An infected patient suffering from pneumonia received Remdesivir on the seventh day of inpatient treatment, and a short time later, according to study authors, his condition improved.
The active ingredient was classified as “highly effective”, at least at the cell level, by another research group. The group pursued the approach of testing existing active substances in the treatment of related viral infections – the coronavirus belongs to the group of betacoronaviruses, which also includes the Sars virus. Medications that were used for these diseases were tested by the researchers.
Several factors remain unexplained
However, several research groups noted that further research was urgently needed on Remdevisir. This is also the view of the drug agency EMA, which, according to Ärzteblatt, has so far no reliable evidence of clinical effectiveness of remdevisir against the coronavirus.
The EMA also advises caution when using Remdevisir, because the drug could affect the liver or kidney under certain circumstances. There are also indications, according to Ärzteblatt, that patients could be hypersensitive to Remdevisir: According to the specialist journal, studies with Ebola patients had fatal consequences.
RND / Alice Mecke / Hö
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