"A Chicago hospital treating severe Covid-19 patients with Gilead Sciences’ antiviral medicine remdesivir in a closely watched clinical trial is seeing rapid recoveries in fever and respiratory symptoms, with nearly all patients discharged in less than a week, STAT has learned.
Remdesivir was one of the first medicines identified as having the potential to impact SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes Covid-19, in lab tests. The entire world has been waiting for results from Gilead’s clinical trials, and positive results would likely lead to fast approvals by the Food and Drug Administration and other regulatory agencies. If safe and effective, it could become the first approved treatment against the disease.
The University of Chicago Medicine recruited 125 people with Covid-19 into Gilead’s two Phase 3 clinical trials. Of those people, 113 had severe disease. All the patients have been treated with daily infusions of remdesivir. STATnews
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Very favorable results. IMO there will be several therapies that prove effective against COVID-19. An effective therapy, as opposed to a vaccine, may save the US economy and the national polity. Without such a therapy the prospects are bleak in spite of all the "whistling in the dark." If we have to wait for a vaccine the wreckage will be so bad by then that the country will be hard to remember as it was. pl
Next year will we have another shut-down and screaming headlines when the equally deadly and readily transmissible “regular flu season” starts? Or will it depend upon who will be sitting in the White House.
That woman from Michigan regrets her impulse to control the lives of others.
Colonel, I wholeheartedly agree that an effective therapy will save the economy. However, that is only true if it is an effective therapy that can be dispensed at a reasonable cost per patient and available to all patients that need it.
This is very good news! Now that it’s more and more apparent there are at least 2 effective treatments, it’s time to begin ending “sheltering in place”. We seem to know enough about the virus at this point to have guidance on how to accomplish a re-opening optimally. The entire country shouldn’t have to suffer because of what’s happened in a few hot spots: NY and NJ ALONE account for OVER HALF of the reported US deaths. Two-thirds of the total deaths are accounted for when MI, MA and LA are added. And if the EU is any guide, it seems as though those in nursing facilities are particularly vulnerable so precautions for them should be easier to institute than if the virus attacked people more randomly.
Data have continued to rebut what the fear mongers would have us believe. But just to be safe, I doubt if many would mind wearing masks in public and washing our hands more frequently for a while longer. Plus, I’m truly weary of all of the virtue-signalling, self-pitying TV ads — it’s not as though we’re experiencing anything even remotely like what people in war-torn countries have had to endure. SMFH. Let us out!!!
Expect Remdesivir to get hyped by the pharmaceutical industry and the (ad-dependent) media much more than chloroquine and its derivatives, even assuming the effectiveness of the drugs in treating the virus turns out to be similar.
The reason? Remdesivir is not off patent yet, production is therefore monopolized and the eventual sale price could be many multiples of the price of chloroquine.
“Analysts at RBC Capital Markets expect Gilead would price the drug at around $900 to $1,000 or lower per course, a cost above oral flu drugs but below new intravenous antibiotics.”
https://www.biopharmadive.com/news/coronavirus-remdesivir-gilead-antiviral-drug-covid-19/573261/
Very promising. Another drug that looks promising is Emory University’s EIDD-2801. This works in a similar fashion to remdesivir, but it has the advantage of coming in a pill form. There are others. Ideally, it will be easy to go to your doctor, get a test for covid-19 and leave with a prescription for a drug to treat it if positive. That’ll take the fear out of it, even if it remains a highly transmissible virus. Maybe something will be in place by Autumn.
All
The Cubans also say they are having good results with Interferon, whatever that is …
David S., you just exposed the Bad Fairies who show up every time at the free health care for all party: rationing, futility of treatment, death panels, triage and cost benefit ratios.
We need a national dialogue about about all of these topics before we sign up for Bernie Sander’s and Ocasio Cortez’s blank check wet dreams.
“How can anyone put a price on a human life?” ends all discussions out here in progressive la-la land – the Left Coast.
Interferon is a naturally produced protein that a key part of our immune system. The Cubans have been using interferon augmentation as a treatment for a wide range of infectious diseases and viruses. Hope it works, too. The more, the merrier.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmOnieOTotY
remdesivir – ??coronavirus treatment update | remdesivir | covid treatment? is remdesivir helpful?
“A total of 32 patients (60%) reported adverse events during follow-up (Table 2). The most common adverse events were increased hepatic enzymes, diarrhea, rash, renal impairment, and hypotension. In general, adverse events were more common in patients receiving invasive ventilation.
A total of 12 patients (23%) had serious adverse events. The most common serious adverse events — multiple-organ-dysfunction syndrome, septic shock, acute kidney injury, and hypotension — were reported in patients who were receiving invasive ventilation at baseline.”
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2007016
Not looking good at all..
Interferon
Signaling protein often used in autoimmune diseases.
If Virus mutates, forget a vaccine:
https://www.foxnews.com/science/mutation-strain-from-india-could-kill-current-research-efforts-for-coronavirus-vaccine-report
Deap,
“another shut-down” we will not have to wait twelve months, the opportunist governors will use their newly proclaimed powers to do that, selectivly perhaps, well before the November election.
David Solomon, “available to all patients that need it.”
The co-morbity people need mandatory weightloss and physical fitness training. That would be a much better expense of money than insurance. We could accelerate the weightloss by forbidding the food and beverage industry from using high fructose corn syrup as an additive to foods for human consumption. Trump should ask Fauci why the FDA thinks it’s safe for human consumption. At least it would stimulate some “conversation” on the subject.
RHO,
A good friend of mine from way back works for Gilead, the company that makes Remdesivir.
We enjoy some friendly ribbing given that our respective companies/industries are sometimes in conflict with each other. Anyhow, I was surprised when he explained to me that Gilead gives gazillions of units of various drugs, especially for HIV/AIDS, to African countries for free every year. Also that because of price controls in the socialized medicine countries, the profit must be made in the US. The US is subsidizing the rest of the world. If the US didn’t do that, Gilead would go out of business and there’d be no drugs for anyone. Additionally, Gilead sells HIV/AIDS drugs on a sliding scale in the US based on ability to pay to people that need them.
Anyhow, it is a very good company and its pharmaceuticals are very effective for conditions that were once thought to be incurable/uncontrollable. Gilead specializes in drugs that work against viruses. They really work. It’s not some vaguely statistically significant kind of thing like a lot of drugs. I’m sure that if one or more of their drugs can knock out this virus, then Gilead will make a reasonable deal to dispense those drugs to those in need.
As as far as I can see (not very – not my subject) the UK’s screwing up with this virus in comparison both with the US and Germany.
HMG seems to be proposing to come off lockdown – when it does come off – with inadequate plans for intensive testing and tracing in place. Compare with Germany, where they test and trace to a considerable extent already according to the BBC, and with the States, where in Miami alone they’re proposing to employ 1000 staff for the job.
Trump explained the correct game plan at one of his press conferences. Get over the surge, get back to work as soon as can be, and then contain local outbreaks with testing and tracing. Sounds good. We’re not doing it.
Nasty disease. Death from it’s compared to “drowning on dry land”. Since the over 60’s don’t fancy risking that they were “self-isolating”, many of them, well before lockdown. If they think it’s high risk even when lockdown ends they’ll most of them, those who can afford it, continue to self-isolate after.
That means they won’t be out and about spending. Since the over 60’s with money usually do a lot of spending that’s a further knock for the economy.
Trump also poured scorn over the “herd immunity” approach. I suspect HMG is still angling for that approach. Trouble with herd immunity is that getting to it involves some culling of the herd first. And that bit of the herd due for the culling is mostly the over 60’s. Who tend to vote Conservative. First time I’ve heard of a Conservative government cheerfully killing off part of its own voter base. But these are unusual times.
A couple of articles from this side of the Atlantic I found interesting and your readers, Colonel, might find them so too. The first is from an Irish paper that looks briefly at one American approach to containing the disease – “Crushing the curve”. The second contains in my view one or two errors – the writer stresses he’s no medical expert – but gives a useful overall picture. Also a powerful attack on the nonsensical business of mixing patients with the virus with patients without in the same hospital.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/coronavirus-the-science-the-case-for-crushing-covid-19-rather-than-living-with-it-1.4227708
https://medium.com/@tepper_jonathan/ground-zero-when-the-cure-is-worse-than-the-disease-3c513d91393d
Deap, I am really not sure what the point of you comment is??
How does the efficacy of any of these treatments determine what should be done now. Once they are tested (even fast-tracked), produced and distributed could take many months. The disease is moving faster than that. Curb your enthusiasm!
“These prevalence estimates represent a range between 48,000 and 81,000 people infected in Santa Clara County by early April, 50-85-fold more than the number of confirmed cases.
Conclusions The population prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in Santa Clara County implies that the infection is much more widespread than indicated by the number of confirmed cases. Population prevalence estimates can now be used to calibrate epidemic and mortality projections.”
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v1
Gentlemen
Today’s Economist hints at Convalescent Plasma (CP) as one such alternative . It also states that in trials conducted in Congo it did better than Remdesivir.
The key paragraph is:
” … Michael Joyner of the Mayo Clinic, which leads a CP research effort in America, expects randomised control trials to begin in a few weeks. They will not just look at CP’s potential as a treatment, but also as a prophylactic. If that worked, it would be a sort of halfway house on the road to a vaccine…
This approach has already been successful against Ebola. Regeneron, an American biotech company, developed a cocktail of three antibodies which recognised different parts of the protein’s coat. Trials in the Democratic Republic of Congo showed this therapy to be better than remdesivir, a drug designed to block the Ebola vaccine’s reproduction which is now, as it happens, being tested as a medicine for covid-19….”
The link to the article should you be interested:
https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/04/16/some-benefits-of-a-covid-vaccine-could-come-early
A.S
They appear to already be moving away from intubation.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/coronavirus/article242012816.html
This is an odd bug.
jeff roby
“produced and distributed could take many months” Not so. Look at the speed with which the VPs task force has acted. If you think they have not, then you are desirous of disaster for the country.
Gentlemen
There are several articles about treatments of COVID-19 in the latest Economist, I posted one and now noticed one specifically about Remdesivir. I found it very informative and complementary to what was posted here earlier.
” … Unlike drugs like hydroxychloroquine, which were made to treat other conditions but might have antiviral effects, remdesivir was designed from the outset to kill viruses. It is a molecule known as a “nucleotide analogue”. Its structure mimics the letters that are used to make up the RNA sequences of the virus. The idea is that when viruses try to use these pseudo-letters it gums up their works. Gilead, a drugmaker from California, developed remdesivir to treat Ebola. Although it performed poorly in this, laboratory tests have shown it to be effective against a range of viruses. Thus there is a reasonable hope that it will work against the new coronavirus, called SARS-CoV-2.
Even if the drug proves successful, it is still experimental, and only limited quantities of such drugs are usually available. Gilead has increased production to meet demand for use in trials. On April 5th, it said it had enough to supply more than 140,000 patients. These sorts of numbers are larger than would be required by clinical trials, so suggest that Gilead is ramping up production for clinical use. The firm also said it was hoping to increase output again as raw materials became available. Looking further ahead, at even broader use, the firm has set an “ambitious goal” of producing more than 500,000 treatment courses by October, and 1m by the end of the year, from a geographically diverse group of suppliers…”
here is the link :
https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2020/04/17/is-remdesivir-the-drug-that-can-kill-the-coronavirus
Luc Antoine Montagnier is a French virologist and joint recipient with Françoise Barré-Sinoussi and Harald zur Hausen of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus.
“Dr Luc Montagnier discovered the HIV virus back in 1983.”
“With my colleague, bio-mathematician Jean-Claude Perez, we carefully analyzed the description of the genome of this RNA virus,” explains Luc Montagnier, interviewed by Dr Jean-François Lemoine for the daily podcast at Pourquoi Docteur, adding that others have already explored this avenue: Indian researchers have already tried to publish the results of the analyses that showed that this coronavirus genome contained sequences of another virus, … the HIV virus (AIDS virus), but they were forced to withdraw their findings as the pressure from the mainstream was too great.
In a challenging question Dr Jean-François Lemoine inferred that the coronavirus under investigation may have come from a patient who is otherwise infected with HIV. No, “says Luc Montagnier,” in order to insert an HIV sequence into this genome, molecular tools are needed, and that can only be done in a laboratory.
The good news is : according to Montagnier “Nature does not accept any molecular tinkering, it will eliminate these unnatural changes and even if nothing is done, things will get better, but unfortunately after many deaths.”
http://thejewishvoice.com/2020/04/2008-nobel-prize-for-medicine-winning-dr-luc-montagnier-says-covid-19-was-manipulated-for-hiv-research/
So for all the experts in the committee please do not pull the Appeal to Authority. I am the master bullshit.
He is a 2008 Nobel Prize winner for Medicine. And I believe him before you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luc_Montagnier
However, in my humble opinion it was not for a AIDS vaccine. The Chinese could care less about treating AIDS patients. And the Professor is trying to carefully opine his opinion without getting lynched by the SJW mob clique which dominates the western scientific field.
Bunch of Fools being used by the Han. Sorry. That’s how I feel.
It was Gain of Function research that either accidentally escaped or worse. Either way when they shut down travel from Wuhan to other areas of China but allowed travel to the rest of the world it became de facto a biowarfare attack.
Been running aroun America for a while.
Lack of testing dors not mean lack of infection.
Was a large death increase in VA area and vaping mystery disease with strangely similar symptoms.
Think I had that bug in January.
Waiting for reliable antibody test.
Technology is all American Chinese grad students were trained here and funded here.
Intelligence community has proven over and over to be the antithesis of intelligence.
Giant waste of money is more like it.
Colonel:
Plenty of people are desirous of disaster for this country and they expect to be around to pick up the pieces and turn America into some sort of politically correct half-assed socialist state.
Inside every liberal is a little tyrant screaming to get out – witness all these blue state Governors on their power trips.
I wonder which country manufactures Remdesivir for Gilead & if
Gilead is contractually obligated to continue to manufacture in
that country.
Novartis is a Swiss company but wouldn’t tell me which country they
used for manufacture. Seems all the pharma companies have circled
the wagons.
Interferon, used primarily to treat hep-C was costing about $1,600
a week I think it’s now been replaced by another drug.
Tsigma, used to treat CML leukemia costs about $13,000 a month.
If the patient utilizes Good RX the insurance company won’t help pay
& ditto if the patient buys the drug from Canada where the cost is
only $3,000 per month. Appears to me the insurance companies don’t
mind spending lots more however I don’t grasp why. However if the patient is basically indigent help may be on the way. Something
very squirrely happening between insurance companies & pharma.
“It was like a double knockout punch. The number of positives was shocking, but the fact that 100 percent of the positives had no symptoms was equally shocking,” said Dr. Jim O’Connell, president of Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program, which provides medical care at the city’s shelters.”
https://www.wsoctv.com/news/trending/coronavirus-cdc-reviewing-stunning-universal-testing-results-boston-homeless-shelter/ZADQ45HCAZEVJAZA3OTCUR7M6M/
That is why, in modern society, we have experts in different fields: everyone has right to express their opinions but some are valid and others based on wishful thinking: https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-04-17/malaria-drugs-fails-to-help-coronavirus-patients-in-controlled-studies
FIRST do no harm.
Amir,
Better is the enemy of good enough.