Experts, the media and official bodies have repeated actively and passively that we must not fall into alarmism regarding the health emergency of the new coronavirus. However, this does not mean not giving it the importance that COVID-19 deserves since, after all, it is a new respiratory disease that we do not want to have, and that governments are trying to contain at all costs.
So far, the only effective prevention measures available are respiratory hygiene and isolation; Regarding coronavirus treatment measures, we only have those aimed at mitigating symptoms, such as analgesics and mucolytics. In the worst case, we will have to learn to live with 2019-nCoV and, therefore, scientists are already working on both a vaccine and effective drugs.
The journal Nature published on February 15 that 80 clinical trials are already underway to test drugs against the new coronavirus. Two of them have already borne fruit, showing an effective response.
The most efficient approach to drug discovery against the new coronavirus is to test whether existing antivirals are effective in treating related viral infections.
2019-nCoV is a new virus, but it is not that we have no clue about it: it belongs to the Betacoronavirus group, which also includes the Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-CoV) and the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS-CoV). Against these, various drugs have been used, but their efficacy is still unclear.
A study published in Nature on February 4 evaluated the antiviral efficacy of several drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and two broad-spectrum antiviral drugs, against an isolated sample of 2019-nCoV in vitro .
The results showed that two of them were “highly effective in controlling the 2019-nCoV infection in vitro “.
Green light for human trials
The FDA gave the green light on February 27 to begin human clinical trials . The studies will consist of the intravenous application of one of the drugs to 1000 patients, mainly from Asian countries.
Of course: as published by Gaceta Médica, one of the two drugs that showed positive results was already applied in January to the first patient , with the intention of applying a palliative measure, in the United States: he was hospitalized and had 12 days from the start symptoms. After application, an improvement in her clinical condition was observed.
The studies should be completed by the end of April, and the first of the drugs could be approved by the Chinese authorities in early May , Shibo Jiang, a virologist at Shanghai Fudan University, told Nature: “However, the epidemic could have disappeared by then, “he recalls.
A vaccine against the new coronavirus
The American pharmaceutical company Moderna (MRNA) made public on February 24 that it already had a vaccine against 2019-nCoV in phase I, that is, ready to be tested in humans. But it is not the only one. Other companies, such as the giant Johnson & Johnson and Sanofi, are also looking for avenues to develop the vaccine.
If, indeed, the worst-case scenario occurs (that we have to live with COVID-19 as just another respiratory disease), the efforts of the international scientific community are essential to mitigate the effects of this new coronavirus.
