New drug tested in fight against coronavirus

A medical expert active in the fight against the ongoing novel coronavirus epidemic in China said on Friday night that medical professionals are using randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials to see whether the experimental drug Remdesivir can be effective in curbing the virus.

Zhao Jianping, head of the respiratory and critical care department at Tongji Hospital of Tongji Medical College in Wuhan, said Chinese medical workers are expecting good results of such trials and are closely monitoring users' conditions.

"Remdesivir is so far the most effective drug in terms of arresting viral growth in lab cells but lacks evidence on its effectiveness on humans," he said at a news conference in Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei province and epicenter of the outbreak.

"We need to examine and verify its safety and potency with a scientific approach so we resorted to randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials."

Two thirds of participants infected with the coronavirus-related pneumonia have been given Remdesivir, which was originally developed as an Ebola cure, in the trials that started in Wuhan on Wednesday. The rest will receive existing medical measures. All of the patients are receiving care by doctors, said Zhao, who is also a consultant to the Hubei provincial government on medical measures against the new coronavirus.

A total of 761 patients were divided into two groups and are participating in two trials -one trial to assess the drug's potency on 308 cases with mild or moderate infection, and the other on 453 severely infected patients.

Speaking of when the drug will be used by all infected people, Zhao said that there are strict assessment methods on new medicines and in the case of Remdesivir, doctors will observe the disease's developments after patients use the drug. Doctors will monitor key indicators such as whether it can help seriously infected people end their reliance on ventilator.

He also explained that medical professionals are confident about the drug's safety because previous trials in foreign nations including those on some Ebola patients have proved that "it has no major adverse reactions".

Gilead Sciences, developer of Remdesivir, said in a recent statement that it has been working with government agencies on the novel coronavirus response efforts.

However, the company stressed that Remdesivir is an experimental medicine that has only been used in a handful of patients on compassionate grounds, "so we do not have an appropriately robust understanding of the effect of this drug to warrant broad use at this time."