COVID-19 News

[yaman]

French expert says second study shows malaria drug helps fight coronavirus

Paris (AFP)

The controversial French professor who believes the anti-malaria drug chloroquine can help beat the coronavirus, has claimed that a new study he has conducted confirms its "efficiency" at combatting the virus.

But several other scientists and critics of microbiologist Didier Raoult, who heads the infectious diseases department of La Timone hospital in Marseille, were quick to cast doubt upon his findings.

They said the testing was not carried out in a controlled study and that the results were purely "observational".

Dr Raoult, whose theory has been taken up by US President Donald Trump, said his new study of 80 patients showed that four out of five of those treated with the drug had "favourable" outcomes.

He had earlier reported that after treating 24 patients for six days with hydroxychloroquine and the antibiotic azithromycin, the virus disappeared in all but a quarter of them.

The research has not yet been peer reviewed nor formally published in a medical journal.

No stranger to controversy, the colourful scientist with shoulder-length blond hair and grey beard, insists that the Chinese pulmonary expert Zhong Nanshan observed a similar pattern.

- Results questioned -

Raoult's critics have pointed to problems with the protocol of his testing and worrying side effects of the drug.

Fakemed, a group of scientists against fake news in health, lambasted the 68-year-old professor.

After Raoult released his latest findings on the internet over the weekend, Professor Francois Balloux of University College, London, tried to dampen talk that the drug could be a silver bullet.

"No, (this is) not 'huge' I'm afraid," he said on Twitter.

"This is an observational study (i.e. not controlled) following 80 patients with fairly mild symptoms. The majority of patients recover form #COVID19 infection, with or without #Hchloroquine and #Azithromycin treatment."

Statistician Tim Morris of the university's clinical trials unit was even more scathing.

"If hydroxychloroquine turns out to be useful," he tweeted, "it's a shame that this group will be praised as heroes and prophets instead of held to account for the misinformation and self-promotion they've been churning out at a critical time."

Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, which is often sold as Plaquenil, have been hailed as a potential "gamechangers" by Trump, but US government experts are as yet unconvinced, with Dr Anthony Fauci, the head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, calling the results so far "anecdotal".

At least one person has already died in the US after self-medicating with a non-pharmaceutical version of the drug used for cleaning fish tanks.

- Fears of shortages -

Fears have also being raised that stockpiling of the drug will deprive people who are already being treated with it for malaria, lupus and certain types of arthritis.

Dr Philippe Gautret, who was part of the team behind Raoult's latest findings, admitted that they only used the combination of drugs on "patients who had not been showing signs of being seriously ill after admission" to the hospital.

"Our strategy was precisely to treat them at that stage to stop the disease getting to a more serious stage," he told AFP.

"A doctor can and must think like a doctor and not like a methodological researcher," Raoult wrote in an article for the French Le Monde daily, defending his methods.

According to his latest study, 65 of the 80 patients treated improved and were discharged from hospital in an average of less than five days. One patient aged 74 was still in intensive care and another aged 86 died.

But his critics say such results were fairly typical of the virus.

Two Chinese studies have shown that "10 days after the start of symptoms, 90 percent of people who have a moderate form (of the disease) have a controlled viral load," epidemiologist Dominique Costagliola, of the French health research institute Inserm, told AFP.

The fact that they got these results using hydroxychloroquine "does not make the case for its effect," she said.

[gebetaforum]

(CNN) Shenzhen, in southeastern China, has become the first city in the country to ban the consumption of cats and dogs, the government announced Thursday.

Under new rules which will come into effect May 1, the government said it will be illegal to eat animals raised as pets.

In February, following the coronavirus outbreak, China passed a law to ban the consumption of wild animals.

Read full story here

[gebetaforum]

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — A group of G20 leaders are preparing an international response to the impact of the coronavirus crisis in Africa that would include debt relief and financial aid, African officials and European diplomats said.

They want rich countries to waive all interest payments on Africa’s debt obligations and provide immediate cash injections through the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and African Development Bank.

Health Ministry projections seen by POLITICO outline a worst-case scenario for Ethiopia predicting that 28 million people are at risk of contracting the virus. Health officials are now working on the assumption that in a worst-case scenario Ethiopia could already be an incubator for a “super-spreading event” and that the health system will be “overwhelmed in a few weeks.” A shortage of medical oxygen supplies is one major concern.

Read more here.

[yaman]

Coronavirus: Anti-parasitic drug Ivermectin kills COVID-19 in lab within 48 hours

An anti-parasitic drug available throughout the world has been found to kill COVID-19 in the lab within 48 hours.

A Monash University-led study has shown a single dose of the drug Ivermectin could stop the SARS-CoV-2 virus growing in cell culture.

“We found that even a single dose could essentially remove all viral RNA (effectively removed all genetic material of the virus) by 48 hours and that even at 24 hours there was a really significant reduction in it,” Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute’s Dr Kylie Wagstaff said on Friday.

While it’s not known how Ivermectin works on the virus, the drug likely stops the virus dampening the host cells’ ability to clear it.

The next step is for scientists to determine the correct human dosage, to make sure the level used in vitro is safe for humans.

“In times when we’re having a global pandemic and there isn’t an approved treatment, if we had a compound that was already available around the world then that might help people sooner,” Dr Wagstaff said.

“Realistically it’s going to be a while before a vaccine is broadly available.”

Before Ivermectin can be used to combat coronavirus, funding is needed to get it to pre-clinical testing and clinical trials.

Ivermectin is an FDA-approved anti-parasitic drug also shown to be effective in vitro against viruses including HIV, dengue and influenza.

The study is the joint work of Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute and the Peter Doherty Institute of Infection and Immunity.

The study findings have been published in Antiviral Research.