Coronavirus: Scientists could repurpose drugs to treat infection
New research zooms in on several antiviral drugs that scientists could repurpose to take care of infections with the novel coronavirus. These drugs include teicoplanin, oritavancin, dalbavancin, monensin, and emetine.
According to the latest report from the World Health Organization (WHO), there are currently 81,109 confirmed cases of COVID-19 - a condition that develops because of infection with the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 - all over the world.
Worldwide, 2,762 persons have already died consequently of the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
There happens to be no cure for this infection, and therefore physicians and medical researchers cannot do much for individuals who have it.
Although most healthy adults can count on their disease fighting capability to fight the infection, the lack of cure or treatment for COVID-19 is specially worrisome for older adults and the ones with conditions such as for example cardiovascular disease, diabetes, respiratory illnesses, and hypertension.
In these contexts, the necessity for urgent treatment is dire. So, a group of European-based scientists have finally reviewed a range of existing broad-spectrum antiviral drugs in the hope that many of them may help treat the brand new virus.
Denis Kainov, an associate professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, is the senior author of the brand new paper. The results come in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases.
Why repurpose existing drugs?
Kainov and colleagues reviewed and summarized the info on 119 “safe-in-man” antiviral agents, called broad-spectrum antiviral agents (BSAAs).
BSAAs are compounds that target viruses “owned by several viral families.”
The researchers explain within their study paper that the paradigm of 1 drug targeting one virus only is currently transforming into a “one drug, multiple viruses” approach. This started with the advent of BSAAs.
Scientists developed BSAAs predicated on the theory that different viruses use similar pathways and host factors to multiply and spread within a cell. Thus, one drug may potentially target a number of different viruses at once.
Kainov and team also explain the advantages of repurposing existing drugs versus creating new kinds in the fight viral infections.
The “chemical synthesis steps, manufacturing processes, reliable safety, and pharmacokinetic properties in [animal models] and early clinical developmental phases (phase 0, I, and IIa) are already available,” they write.
“Drug repurposing is a technique for generating extra value from a preexisting drug by targeting diseases besides that for which it was originally intended.”
- Denis Kainov
The authors describe that “a substantially higher possibility of success to advertise” and “a considerably reduced cost and timeline to clinical availability” are just a number of the unique opportunities supplied by drug repurposing for treating COVID-19.
Source: www.medicalnewstoday.com
