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New COVID-19 Drug Passes Phase 2 Clinical Trial

AHA Publisher — Thu, 20 Jan 2022 08:00:34 +0000

Sanford Burnham Prebys via Newswise – LA JOLLA, CALIF. – Jan 18, 2021 – In a phase 2 clinical trial conducted by Avalo Therapeutics and supported by researchers from Sanford Burnham Prebys, a significantly higher proportion of hospitalized patients with COVID-19 remained alive and free of respiratory failure for 28 days after receiving treatment with a new antibody called CERC-002. Unlike other experimental COVID therapies, CERC-002 does not target the virus itself, instead targeting the immune response associated with the virus to stop the disease from progressing before it becomes fatal. “At the beginning of the pandemic we thought vaccines were going to be all we really needed. But with variants like omicron, we’re going to have more people that progress to serious illness even with the vaccine,” says study coauthor Carl F. Ware, Ph.D., director of the Infectious and Inflammatory Diseases Center at Sanford Burnham Prebys. “We need treatments to stop the progression to severe disease and death.” The findings were published December 6 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. COVID-19: a Continuing Crisis In the United States, over 800,000 people have died from COVID-19. A large proportion of these deaths have been among the elderly or those who are immunocompromised due to a preexisting condition. And while three quarters of the population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, many remain unvaccinated. “A lot of us feel safer now that we’ve gotten our shots,” Ware says, “but the threat of the pandemic has not gone away, even for vaccinated people.” Most people with COVID-19 experience few to no symptoms. However, elderly individuals, people with a concurrent health condition or those who are immunocompromised are susceptible to a condition called cytokine storm, in which their own immune molecules called cytokines flood the body in higher concentrations than usual. Rather than helping fight the virus, these extra immune molecules wreak havoc, causing patients to develop the deadly respiratory failure characteristic of severe COVID disease. “The COVID virus gets the immune system amped up by producing these molecules, which is normally how the immune system fights diseases,” says Ware. “But when there are too many cytokines and they’re not doing their job, it can lead to severe damage.” Neutralizing the Cytokine Storm The new treatment, CERC-002, is a cytokine neutralizer—an immune molecule that recognizes and deactivates a cytokine known as LIGHT, which is elevated in patients with COVID-19. Cytokine neutralization drugs are currently being tested in the clinic, but they are mainly effective in severely ill patients who are already on a ventilator or other organ support. “There is a critical need for drugs to stop milder cases from progressing to severe,” says Ware. “This treatment targets the cytokine immune response early enough to stop it in its tracks, which no other treatment does right now.” 83 COVID patients were enrolled in the study, half receiving the treatment, and half receiving a placebo. All patients were hospitalized with mild-to-moderate respiratory distress and were also receiving standard-of-care therapy during the trial. They found that 83.9% of patients who received a dose of CERC-002 on top of standard of care remained alive and free from respiratory distress for 28 days. For patients receiving placebo, the number was only 64.5%. Looking Ahead As a phase 2 clinical trial, the purpose of this study was to test whether the compound has therapeutic potential in a small number of patients. Now that the drug has proven successful at a small scale, it can be tested on a larger number of patients to ensure its benefits are consistent across the population. Additionally, because CEC-002 targets the immune response in COVID cases rather than the virus itself, the compound may have applications that extend beyond COVID. “Cytokine storm is not unique to COVID. It occurs in other infections—even in autoimmune diseases with no active infection, so this treatment may have some utility in these other diseases as well.” While there is more work to be done before CERC-002 becomes widely available, it does offer a glimmer of hope during a pandemic that seems never-ending. “We have made a lot of progress in controlling the pandemic with vaccines and other new therapies, but it’s not over yet,” says Ware. “Treatments like this may bring physicians an option to protect infected people from severe illness. To read the original article click here.

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UK Gives OK to Merck’s Breakthrough Anti-COVID Pill, Pfizer Announces Its Antiviral Pill Works Too

AHA Publisher — Mon, 08 Nov 2021 08:00:32 +0000

CBN News – The United Kingdom granted conditional authorization Thursday to the first pill officially shown to successfully treat COVID-19. It’s the first country to OK the treatment from drugmaker Merck, but it is not known when the pill will be available to the public. Those with mild to moderate COVID symptoms would take four pills of molnupiravir, twice a day for five days. Adults 18 or older who have tested positive for COVID-19 and who could be at risk for developing severe disease, including people with issues like obesity or heart disease, are slated to be the first patients to receive the pill. Molnupiravir is also pending review with regulators in the U.S., the European Union, and other countries. Merck has said it can produce 10 million treatment courses through the end of the year, but much of that supply has already been purchased by governments worldwide, so initial supplies of the pill could be limited. “Today is a historic day for our country, as the U.K. is now the first country in the world to approve an antiviral that can be taken at home for COVID-19,” British Health Secretary Sajid Javid said. “We are working at pace across the government and with the NHS to set out plans to deploy molnupiravir to patients through a national study as soon as possible,” he said in a statement, referring to the U.K.’s National Health Service. Doctors said the treatment would be particularly significant for people who don’t respond well to vaccination. Merck announced preliminary results in September showing its drug cut hospitalizations and deaths by half among patients with early COVID-19 symptoms. The results haven’t yet been peer-reviewed or published in a scientific journal. Pfizer Announces Another Pill to Fight COVID On Friday, Pfizer also announced it has successfully tested an experimental antiviral pill for COVID-19 as well. Pfizer claims its pill cut rates of hospitalization and death by nearly 90%. Fewer than 1% of patients taking the drug needed to be hospitalized and no one died. “We were hoping that we had something extraordinary, but it’s rare that you see great drugs come through with almost 90% efficacy and 100% protection for death,” said Dr. Mikael Dolsten, Pfizer’s chief scientific officer. How Merck’s Drug Works The Merck drug targets an enzyme the coronavirus uses to reproduce itself, inserting errors into its genetic code that slow its ability to spread and take over human cells. That genetic activity has led some independent experts to question whether the drug could potentially cause mutations leading to birth defects or tumors. Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said molnupiravir’s ability to interact with DNA and cause mutations had been studied “extensively” and that it wasn’t found to pose a risk to humans. “Studies in rats showed that (molnupiravir) may cause harmful effects to the unborn offspring, although this was at doses which were higher than those that will be given to humans, and these effects were not observed in other animals,” the agency said in an email. Last week, Merck agreed to allow other drugmakers to make its COVID-19 pill, in a move aimed at helping millions of people in poorer countries receive the pill. The Medicines Patent Pool, a U.N.-backed group, said Merck will not receive royalties under the agreement for as long as the World Health Organization deems COVID-19 to be a global emergency. The U.S. has agreed to pay roughly $700 per course of the drug for about 1.7 million treatments. Merck says it plans to use a tiered pricing strategy for developing countries. A review by Harvard University and King’s College London estimated the drug costs about $18 to make each 40-pill course of treatment. Will Merck’s Pill Be Approved in the US? As CBN News reported last month, Merck requested U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorization for its COVID pill. The FDA said it would convene a panel of independent experts to scrutinize the pill’s safety and effectiveness later this month. “Of importance is that in the placebo group there were eight deaths, and in the treatment group there were no deaths,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “That’s also very important and very good news.” Molnupiravir was initially studied as a potential flu therapy with funding from the U.S. government. Last year, researchers at Emory University decided to repurpose the drug as a potential COVID-19 treatment. They then licensed the drug to Ridgeback and partner Merck. To read the original article click here.

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An Old Drug Saves Lives of COVID-19 Patients

AHA Publisher — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 07:00:02 +0000

McMaster University via Newswise – Hamilton, ON (Oct. 27, 2021) – An inexpensive repurposed drug called fluvoxamine can save the lives of COVID-19 patients and cut hospital admissions by up to 30 per cent, says a study co-led by McMaster University. McMaster researcher Edward Mills and his team treated 739 randomly selected Brazilian COVID-19 patients with fluvoxamine, with another 733 receiving a placebo, between Jan. 15 to Aug. 6 of this year. Every patient who received fluvoxamine during the trial was tracked for 28 days to determine their health outcomes and if they still need hospital treatment. Researchers found about a 30 per cent reduction in hospitalizations among those receiving fluvoxamine compared to those receiving the placebo. This effect went up to 65% among patients taking all of their drugs. The fluvoxamine trial formed part of the larger TOGETHER Trial that started in May 2020, aiming to test potential COVID-19 treatments in a community setting. “Fluvoxamine is, so far, the only treatment that if administered early, can prevent COVID-19 from becoming a life-threatening illness. It could be one of our most powerful weapons against the virus and its effectiveness is one of the most important discoveries we have made since the pandemic began,” said Mills, co-principal investigator for the TOGETHER Trial and a professor of McMaster’s Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact. TOGETHER Trial researchers published their findings in The Lancet on Oct. 27. “In addition, this cheap, easily-accessible pill is a massive boon to public health, both in Canada and internationally, allowing hospitals to avoid expensive and sometimes risky treatments.” Costing about $4 per 10-day course, fluvoxamine could be a game-changer for poorer countries with low vaccination rates and lacking access to more advanced COVID-19 therapies, he added. Fluvoxamine has been used since the 1990s for various conditions and its safety profile is well-known. It was identified early in the pandemic for its potential to reduce the cytokine storm in COVID-19 patients. Cytokine storms are severe immune responses to COVID-19 that can cause potentially lethal organ damage. Joining McMaster’s scientists in the TOGETHER Trial were researchers from the CardResearch Cardiologia Assistencial e de Pesquisa LTDA in Brazil. The TOGETHER trial researchers have also submitted their research to the U.S.-based National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization. External funding for the study was received from FastGrants and The Rainwater Foundation. To read the original article click here.

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Nebraska AG Allows Ivermectin and HCQ Prescriptions as Off-Label Medicines to Fight COVID

AHA Publisher — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 07:00:31 +0000

Steve Warren via CBN News – Nebraska’s attorney general has said he will not discipline or prosecute physicians who prescribe controversial, off-label drugs in order to treat and prevent COVID-19 infections if they have patient consent. KETV reported Attorney General Doug Peterson issued his 48-page opinion Friday after receiving a question from Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services CEO Dannette Smith. She asked if doctors could face discipline or legal action under Nebraska’s Uniform Credential Act (UCA) if they prescribed medications like Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine to fight COVID-19 in their patients. “After receiving your question and conducting our investigation, we have found significant controversy and suspect information about potential COVID-19 treatment,” Peterson wrote. He also cited numerous medical journals’ articles and case studies. “We emphasize… our office is not recommending any specific treatments for COVID-19. That is not our role,” the attorney general continued. “Rather, we address only the off-label early treatment options discussed in this opinion and conclude that the available evidence suggests they might work for some people,” Peterson wrote. “Allowing physicians to consider these early treatments will free them to evaluate additional tools that could save lives, keep patients out of the hospital, and provide relief for our already strained health care system.” The FDA has cautioned against using hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) to treat COVID. Former President Trump took HCQ early in the pandemic to prevent a COVID-19 infection, then he stopped using it in May of 2020. Other famous people said the drug worked for them. Actor Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson said HCQ was useful in their recovery from the coronavirus. Actor Daniel Dae Kim (Lost & Hawaii Five-0) claimed HCQ was the “secret weapon” that helped in his recovery from the disease. Last year, Pastor A.R. Bernard of the Christian Cultural Center in Brooklyn, NY, talked about his harrowing bout with COVID-19 and how the drug cocktail with hydroxychloroquine and the antibiotic azithromycin saved his life. Families Filing Lawsuits Against Hospitals, Seeking Alternative COVID Treatments for Loved Ones At least two dozen lawsuits have been filed around the U.S., many in recent weeks, by people seeking to force hospitals to give their COVID-stricken loved ones ivermectin, a drug for parasites that has been promoted as a treatment despite a lack of conclusive evidence that it helps people with the virus. Interest in the drug started rising toward the end of last year and the beginning of this one, when studies – some later withdrawn, in other countries – seemed to suggest ivermectin had some potential in the fight against COVID-19. But some medical experts suggest having a court step in is not the way to practice medicine. “The way medicine works is, they are the experts, the doctors and… the hospitals,” Arthur Caplan, professor of bioethics at New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine told the Associated Press. “When you go there, you’re not going to a restaurant. You don’t order your own treatments.” “You can’t have a medical field that’s subjected to having to practice according to patient demand backed up by court orders. That is positively horrible medicine,” Caplan said. Ralph Lorigo doesn’t see it that way. The attorney from Buffalo, New York, filed his first of several ivermectin lawsuits in January after being approached by the family of an 80-year-old woman who was in the hospital on a ventilator. His second case was later that month, for a hospitalized 65-year-old woman. In both cases, judges ordered hospitals to allow the women to take ivermectin as their families wanted. Both women survived their hospitalizations, according to the AP. Lorigo, who has taken on numerous cases since is adamant that ivermectin works. Health experts and federal agencies say that any evidence of it being effective against COVID-19 is slim and more research needs to be done. Studies are currently underway. Israeli Clinical Trials Show Positive Results with Ivermectin As CBN News reported earlier this month, a top Israeli doctor was asked by Israel’s government to research treatments for COVID. His studies indicated positive results with ivermectin in clinical trials. Dr. Eli Schwartz, M.D. is the founder of the Center for Travel Medicine and Tropical Diseases at the Sheba Medical Center in Israel. It’s considered one of the world’s top hospitals. Dr. Schwartz is also a professor at Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University. For decades, Schwartz has traveled the world fighting outbreaks like Dengue Fever and Ebola. At the beginning of the pandemic and months before any vaccine was available, Israel’s Defense Ministry assigned Schwartz to find a medical solution for COVID-19. “Since Ivermectin is one of the drugs that we are using in daily life in the Tropical Institute, I knew it. I know the safety profile of it. And since there was some hints of in-vitro studies, which show the efficacy against specifically, even against COVID-19, we decided to go for it,” he said. That meant putting the drug through a clinical trial that lasted 10 months. “Our study, which was done here, it’s a randomized controlled trial, double-blind. It’s really, I would say, this is the best method that you are doing studies. And our conclusion is that it really has antiviral activities,” Schwartz told CBN News. From his international experience in the field, Schwartz knew Ivermectin targeted parasites. Since its development in 1987, nearly 4 billion doses with few side effects and at low cost have protected millions of people from insidious parasitical diseases like River Blindness and Elephantiasis. That success won its developers the Nobel Prize for medicine in 2015. Schwartz’s study made headlines in Israel when his trial showed Ivermectin to also be anti-viral. “This is the first drug to show antiviral activity,” the doctor explained. “And then, I think, there’s a good reason to continue with a much more thorough investigation to see, for example, whether people who are at high risk, may not deteriorate to be hospitalized, to be mechanically ventilated, or to death.” Schwartz’s clinical study found that by day four, 86% of his patients who took ivermectin recovered. By day six, 94% recovered. “The bottom line is… Ivermectin decreased faster the viral load, and also sterilized the culture much better compared to the placebo,” he noted. Schwartz explained to CBN News this means Ivermectin killed the virus and his patients became non-infectious. He said this development could save lives and reduce quarantines by days. “It’s a huge change in life. It’s a huge change for the patient. It’s a huge change for his family. And from the economical point of view, it’s a dramatic change. You know, it’s how much money you can save for the economy of the country if you can shorten the isolation time,” he said. Use Not Accepted by Global Heath Professionals But ivermectin is not accepted by the global health establishment. A major FDA concern is that a number of people have tried to self-medicate using a form of the drug intended for livestock. “Don’t do it. There’s no evidence whatsoever that it works and it could potentially have toxicity…with people who have gone to poison control centers because they’ve taken the drug at a ridiculous dose and wind up getting sick,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The World Health Organization advises “that Ivermectin only be used be used to treat COVID-19 within clinical trials.” The National Institutes of Health said, “Ivermectin is not approved by the FDA for the treatment of any viral infection” and that “well-conducted clinical trials are needed to provide more specific, evidence-based guidance on the role of ivermectin in the treatment of COVID-19.” For studies to be accepted by the broader medical community, it must be peer-reviewed and published in a medical journal. That’s where Prof. Schwartz hit a roadblock. Several journals turned him down, but one is currently reviewing his study. Schwartz added that while many health agencies want better studies, no large-scale trials on ivermectin happened until Oxford University began one in June of this year. “I mean, it took them 18 months from the beginning of the pandemic to try to do it. I mean, people dying all over the world. And you have drug under your hand and you have to wait so long until you get any conduction of a good study,” he said. ‘We Are in the Arms of Pharma, and the Pharma Is Looking for New Drugs’ Now, the pharmaceutical company Merck, which developed ivermectin, and Pfizer are in a race to produce an oral anti-viral drug for COVID that some believe is what ivermectin could do already. “In my view, the whole story of Ivermectin is much beyond Ivermectin. It’s even beyond the corona. The problem is that we are in the arms of the pharma and the pharma is looking for new drugs. And, therefore, all old drugs which might be with a good potential to use it for whatever you’re looking for, there’s not any parents to push for it,” Schwartz claimed. Prof. Schwartz advocates the use of ivermectin but also believes in the vaccine. “Most of the world, still vaccine is not available. So, if we have a medication that can try to reduce the magnitude of the pandemic in the meantime, that’s absolutely needed, but when, if I have to compare the vaccine and Ivermectin for prevention, no doubt the vaccine. This is the solution, the international solution,” he said. Schwartz hopes more research will prove the drug can help fight the pandemic and that it will eventually be allowed to treat patients on a widespread basis and not just within clinical trials. To read the original article click here.

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Israeli Scientist Says COVID-19 Could Be Treated for Under $1/day

AHA Publisher — Mon, 30 Aug 2021 07:00:00 +0000

Maayan Jaffe-Hoffman viaThe Jerusalem Post– Ivermectin, a drug used to fight parasites in third-world countries, could help reduce the length of infection for people who contract coronavirus for less than a $1 a day, according to recent research by Sheba Medical Centerin Tel Hashomer. Prof. Eli Schwartz, founder of the Center for Travel Medicine and Tropical Disease at Sheba, conducted a randomized, controlled, double-blinded trial from May 15, 2020, through the end of January 2021 to evaluate the effectiveness of ivermectin in reducing viral shedding among nonhospitalized patients with mild to moderate COVID-19. Ivermectin has been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration since 1987. The drug’s discoverers were awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize in medicine for its treatment of onchocerciasis, a disease caused by infection with a parasitic roundworm. Over the years, it has been used for other indications, including scabies and head lice. Moreover, in the last decade, several clinical studies have started to show its antiviral activity against viruses ranging from HIV and the flu to Zika and West Nile. The drug is also extremely economical. A study published in the peer-reviewed American Journal of Therapeutics showed that the cost of ivermectin for other treatments in Bangladesh is around $0.60 to $1.80 for a five-day course. It costs up to $10 a day in Israel, Schwartz said. In Schwartz’s study, some 89 eligible volunteers over the age of 18 who were diagnosed with coronavirus and staying in state-run COVID-19 hotels were divided into two groups: 50% received ivermectin, and 50% received a placebo, according to their weight. They were given the pills for three days in a row, an hour before a meal. The volunteers were tested using a standard nasopharyngeal swab PCR test with the goal of evaluating whether there was a reduction in viral load by the sixth day – the third day after termination of the treatment. They were swabbed every two days. Nearly 72% of volunteers treated with ivermectin tested negative for the virus by day six. In contrast, only 50% of those who received the placebo tested negative. Over the years, it has been used for other indications, including scabies and head lice. Moreover, in the last decade, several clinical studies have started to show its antiviral activity against viruses ranging from HIV and the flu to Zika and West Nile. The drug is also extremely economical. A study published in the peer-reviewed American Journal of Therapeutics showed that the cost of ivermectin for other treatments in Bangladesh is around $0.60 to $1.80 for a five-day course. It costs up to $10 a day in Israel, Schwartz said. In Schwartz’s study, some 89 eligible volunteers over the age of 18 who were diagnosed with coronavirus and staying in state-run COVID-19 hotels were divided into two groups: 50% received ivermectin, and 50% received a placebo, according to their weight. They were given the pills for three days in a row, an hour before a meal. The volunteers were tested using a standard nasopharyngeal swab PCR test with the goal of evaluating whether there was a reduction in viral load by the sixth day – the third day after termination of the treatment. They were swabbed every two days. Nearly 72% of volunteers treated with ivermectin tested negative for the virus by day six. In contrast, only 50% of those who received the placebo tested negative. IN ADDITION, the study looked at culture viability, meaning how infectious the patients were, and found that only 13% of ivermectin patients were infectious after six days, compared with 50% of the placebo group – almost four times as many. “Our study shows first and foremost that ivermectin has antiviral activity,” Schwartz said. “It also shows that there is almost a 100% chance that a person will be noninfectious in four to six days, which could lead to shortening isolation time for these people. This could have a huge economic and social impact.” The study appeared on the MedRxiv health-research sharing site. It has not yet been peer reviewed. Schwartz said other similar studies – though not all of them conducted to the same double-blind and placebo standards as his – also showed a favorable impact of ivermectin treatment. His study did not prove ivermectin was effective as a prophylactic, meaning that it could prevent disease, he cautioned, nor did it show that it reduces the chances of hospitalization. However, other studies have shown such evidence, he added. For example, the study published earlier this year in the American Journal of Therapeutics highlighted that “a review by the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance summarized findings from 27 studies on the effects of ivermectin for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 infection, concluding that ivermectin ‘demonstrates a strong signal of therapeutic efficacy’ against COVID-19.” “Another recent review found that ivermectin reduced deaths by 75%,” the report said. BUT IVERMECTIN is not without controversy, and hence, despite the high levels of coronavirus worldwide, neither the FDA nor the World Health Organization have been willing to approve it for use in the fight against the virus. Prof. Ya’acov Nahmias, a Hebrew University of Jerusalem researcher, has questioned the safety of the drug. “Ivermectin is a chemical therapeutic agent, and it has significant risks associated with it,” he said in a previous interview. “We should be very cautious about using this type of medication to treat a viral disease that the vast majority of the public is going to recover from even without this treatment.” During Schwartz’s study, there was not any signal of significant side effects among ivermectin users. Only five patients were referred to hospitals, with four of them being in the placebo arm. One ivermectin patient went to the hospital complaining of shortness of breath on the day of recruitment. He continued with the ivermectin treatment and was sent back to the hotel a day later in good condition. The FDA said on its website it “received multiple reports of patients who have required medical support and been hospitalized after self-medicating with ivermectin.” The “FDA has not approved ivermectin for use in treating or preventing COVID-19 in humans,” it said. “Ivermectin tablets are approved at very specific doses for some parasitic worms, and there are topical (on the skin) formulations for head lice and skin conditions like rosacea. Ivermectin is not an antiviral (a drug for treating viruses). Taking large doses of this drug is dangerous and can cause serious harm.” The World Health Organization has also recommended against using the drug except in clinical trials. IN CONTRAST, Schwartz said he was very disappointed that the WHO did not support any trial to determine whether the drug could be viable. Last month, Oxford University announced a large trial on ivermectin effectiveness. Schwartz said he became interested in exploring ivermectin about a year ago, “when everyone was looking for a new drug” to treat COVID-19, and a lot of effort was being put into evaluating hydroxychloroquine, so he decided to join the effort. “Since ivermectin was on my shelf, since we are using it for tropical diseases, and there were hints it might work, I decided to go for it,” he said. Researchers in other places worldwide began looking into the drug at around the same time. But when they started to see positive results, no one wanted to publish them, Schwartz said. “There is a lot of opposition,” he said. “We tried to publish it, and it was kicked away by three journals. No one even wanted to hear about it. You have to ask how come when the world is suffering.” “This drug will not bring any big economic profits,” and so Big Pharma doesn’t want to deal with it, he said. SOME OF the loudest opposition to ivermectin has come from Merck Co., which manufactured the drug in the 1980s. In a public statement about ivermectin on its website in February, it said: “Company scientists continue to carefully examine the findings of all available and emerging studies of ivermectin for the treatment of COVID-19 for evidence of efficacy and safety. It is important to note that, to date, our analysis has identified no scientific basis for a potential therapeutic effect against COVID-19 from pre-clinical studies; no meaningful evidence for clinical activity or clinical efficacy in patients with COVID-19 disease, and a concerning lack of safety data in the majority of studies.” But Merck has not launched any studies of its own on ivermectin. “You would think Merck would be happy to hear that ivermectin might be helpful to corona patients and try to study it, but they are most loudly declaring the drug should not be used,” Schwartz said. “A billion people took it. They gave it to them. It’s a real shame.” And not moving forward with ivermectin could potentially extend the time it takes for the world to be able to live alongside the virus, he said. “Developing new medications can take years; therefore, identifying existing drugs that can be re-purposed against COVID-19 [and] that already have an established safety profile through decades of use could play a critical role in suppressing or even ending the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic,” wrote the researchers in the American Journal of Therapeutics. “Using re-purposed medications may be especially important because it could take months, possibly years, for much of the world’s population to get vaccinated, particularly among low- to middle-income populations.” To read the original article click here.

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Caution, Not Fear: The COVID Death Rate Has Plunged Since April, but Hospitalizations Are Spiking Again

AHA Publisher — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 08:00:41 +0000

Lorie Johnson via CBN News – Hospitals across the nation are pushed to the limit due to a spike in COVID-19 cases. Things are particularly bad in Utah and parts of the Midwest. In El Paso, Texas, the situation is so dire residents face a mandatory 10:00 p.m. curfew to blunt the impact. El Paso’s largest hospital has prepared for the worst by erecting overflow tents in the parking lot in case there aren’t enough beds inside to handle a possible influx of patients. Nationwide, 42,000 people have been hospitalized this week. In Texas, that number surpasses 5,000 – almost double what it was last month. Texas physician Craig DeLisi told CBN News he’s concerned about the rise in hospitalizations. “I think as we see an increase there unfortunately I think we’re going to see an up-tick in deaths as well,” he said. Dr. DeLisi said one reason for the increase in cases and hospitalizations is the cooler weather, which drives people inside where the disease is more easily spread. Also, after seven months of practicing mitigation efforts, people are simply tired of wearing maskings and keeping their distance from others. “Just a general fatigue of people from a caution standpoint,” he said. “Masks are a mixed bag of peoples’ responses. More people would rather leave them than take them and as that happens, naturally we’re going to see more people infected.” Therefore, the doctor prescribes caution, but no fear. “We’re commanded not to be anxious about anything,” he said. “In Philippians, it tells us with prayer and thanksgiving to present our requests to God and he promises the peace of God will rule our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” While a lot of attention is focused on increased infections in some places, one often overlooked statistic is the drastic reduction in death rates, a reported 80% since April. According to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the U.S. death rate now stands at 2.6%, lower than 14 other countries in Europe, South America and the Middle East. Six months ago, patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in the US faced a 25% chance of death. Now doctors are seeing a much lower death rate of 7% among those hospitalized with the virus. “Praise the Lord for that,” said Dr. DeLisi, “There are two reasons for that. One is a better understanding of the disease and the second is better therapeutics.” That includes the anti-viral medication Remdesivir which blocks the replication of the virus. On October 22, 2020, it became the first drug to be approved by the FDA to treat COVID-19. In clinical trials, the drug demonstrated an ability to hasten recovery from the virus. Dexamethasone is another widely used drug that has proven effective in treating COVID-19. The steroid medication has been given Emergency Use Authorization by the FDA and is used to calm the often deadly “cytokine storm,” the over-reaction of the immune system caused by massive inflammation. Both Remdesivir and Dexamethasone were given to President Trump after he was diagnosed with COVID-19. One of the most highly touted drugs given to the president, a polyclonal antibody made by the pharmaceutical company Regeneron, isn’t yet available to the general public, but the FDA could issue an Emergency Use Authorization in the months ahead. President Trump is one of only a couple of hundred people to be given the drug on a Compassion Use basis. The drug stimulates a robust immune response to the virus. In the meantime, hospitals are now using a similar treatment, convalescent plasma, which is antibody-rich blood donated by people who have survived COVID-19. To read the original article click here. For more articles from CBN News click here.

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Hospitalizations Rise in Coronavirus Surge, but Death Rate Is Much Lower Than It Once Was

AHA Publisher — Wed, 28 Oct 2020 07:00:13 +0000

News Staff via CBN News – Coronavirus cases are rising again here in the US, as well as in multiple other countries in Europe. Many experts had expected the virus to surge again when the weather cooled down. Last week the seven-day average for new COVID cases hit its highest level on record with 16 states also hitting record hospitalizations. The only bright spot in an otherwise dreary outlook for COVID is that the death rate is much lower now. CBN News Medical Correspondent Lorie Johnson says the drop in the death rate is very clear among those who have been hospitalized. “The death rate has really gone down from 25 percent down to 7 percent. These are people who are hospitalized for coronavirus. So that’s down 18 percent, and that’s wonderful news,” she explained. Johnson says improved therapeutics and treatments are helping decrease the death rate. The broader percentage has also gotten better as the number of people tested increases. Right now Johnson says there are about a million people tested each day in the US. “The death rate is based on how many people test positive, out of that number how many people die from it and at the very beginning of the pandemic usually the only people who were tested were those who were very sick, and reported to the hospital.” For young people, 99.9 percent of them recover just fine from the virus. Still, the increasing number of cases is putting a strain on many hospitals with some not having enough space or staff to handle new patients. Data from the COVID Tracking Project shows that nationwide, in cases where race is known, black people are dying at 2.3 times the rate of white people. And while those who live in nursing homes make up 1 percent of the population, they make up 41 percent of COVID deaths. To read the original article click here. For more articles from CBN News click here.

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