Why scientists are racing to develop more COVID antivirals
Source: Nature
A pharmacist stocks shelves with Pfizer's oral pills against COVID-19, Paxlovid, in Seoul, South Kora
Pharmacy shelves worldwide are being stocked with COVID-19 antivirals Paxlovid (pictured) and molnupiravir.Credit: YONHAP/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
The roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines at the beginning of 2021 marked a key turning point in the fight against the global pandemic. Another major milestone arrived at the end of the year, with the approval of two oral antiviral treatments — molnupiravir and Paxlovid — that promise to reduce the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths. But as these pills slowly make their way into pharmacies worldwide, researchers are already looking ahead to the drugs that could supersede them.
“These are our first-generation antivirals against coronaviruses,” says Sara Cherry, an immunologist at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Our experience with antivirals against other diseases, like hepatitis C and HIV, proves that “we can do better and better over time”, she adds.
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Clinical-trial data showed that molnupiravir, developed by the pharmaceutical firm Merck, based in Kenilworth, New Jersey, and the biotechnology company Ridgeback Biotherapeutics in Miami, Florida, cut hospitalizations and deaths by 30%, compared with people who took placebos. Meanwhile, Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir and ritonavir), made by Pfizer, based in New York City, cut hospitalizations and deaths by 89%. UK regulators approved molnupiravir in November and Paxlovid in December, and US regulators granted emergency authorizations for both drugs in December. Other countries have followed suit with their own approvals, and many are negotiating with the drug makers to buy courses of the drugs or to manufacture their own generic versions.
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LINK:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00112-8