Joint worldwide effort to develop Long Covid treatment

After a multi-systemic focus on corona virus vaccines and treatments, researchers and drug manufacturers are investing their efforts in developing a long-covid drug, the elusive phenomenon that is identified with about 200 reported symptoms and causes long weeks of suffering for millions of people infected with corona.Leading drug manufacturers, including those that have launched antiviral and monoclonal antibodies to corona, are conducting early discussions with researchers on what to focus on treatments. Among the questions trying to come up with a solution are why do some people develop long-term symptoms – often after a mild case of corona, sometimes even after vaccination – while others recover completely? How can one disease affect many bodily systems, causing severe symptoms, from brain fog to joint pain to complete exhaustion, and is Long COVID a single diagnosis, or should it be treated as a umbrella term for a variety of diseases, caused by a variety of biological effects of the virus?

Possible underlying causes that researchers are investigating include damage from the original infection, persistent virus stores in the body, an autoimmune response in which the immune system attacks its cells and an unregulated immune response that causes excess inflammation that damages small blood vessels or nerves.

Currently, there are less than 20 clinical trials worldwide in the midst of drug trials, a handful of which have passed into early stages. “I hope we have things we can offer to people who are suffering to get their lives back to normal in the near future.” Said David Strain, a lecturer at the School of Medicine at the University of Exeter, whose research is part of a British experiment on long covid.

The UK government-funded trial will test four drugs among 4,500 long-term COVID patients. The trial includes antihistamines lortadine and femutidine, colchicine for the treatment of gout and heart infections – all available as generic – and Johnson & Johnson’s Xarelto (rivaroxaban) (JNJ.N) which prevents blood clots.

All of these drugs have data from preliminary studies conducted on individuals indicating that they can act against some of the possible disease targets for long-term COVID, such as inflammation and blood clots. One of the investigators noted in a telephone interview with the Reuters network that “this is challenging, because we are going for a vague goal.”

At the same time, the US-based Axcella Therapeutics Laboratory is working with the University of Oxford in the UK on a drug developed for non-alcoholic stasis hepatitis (NASH), a liver disease characterized by unregulated metabolism, inflammation and scarring. Mitochondria in dysfunction may explain the long-term fatigue experienced by many who have recovered from corona, or as lead researcher Dr. Betty Raman put it – “If the corona virus has damaged the battery, the drug aims to restore the battery so that the cells can perform their normal functions. Without consuming too much energy. ”

PureTech Health (PRTC.L), another biotechnology lab in the U.S., is conducting an intermediate trial of experimental treatment for pulmonary fibrosis aimed at preventing long-term lung scars related to corona.

In Seattle, researchers at the University of Washington and the Fred Hutchinson COVID Clinical Research Center are testing Resolve Therapeutics’ experimental treatment that focuses on fatigue in long-term COVID patients. The drug works by dissolving a specific RNA in the blood that is associated with increased inflammation in patients with autoimmune diseases like lupus and Sjogren’s syndrome, said Dr. James Andrews, a rheumatologist at the University of Washington who is leading the trial.

In addition, scientists are interested in testing whether existing corona treatments or vaccines can also have an effect. Moderna is contributing its vaccine to early trials in the UK to see if it can help boost the immune system and relieve long-term COVID symptoms.