India
is all set to join World Health Organisation’s “Solidarity trial” aimed at
rapid global search for drugs to treat COVID-19. ICMR (Indian Council of
Medical Research) said that, the country has stayed away so far from this
multi-country trial “due to its small sample size and because our contribution
would have looked minuscule.
Many
countries, including Argentina, Bahrain, Canada, France, Iran, Norway, South
Africa, Spain, Switzerland, and Thailand, have already confirmed that they will
join the solidarity trial. WHO has also created a COVID-19 Solidarity Response
Fund, to help provide protective equipment for front-line health workers, equip
diagnostic laboratories, improve surveillance and data collection, establish
and maintain intensive care units, strengthen supply chains, accelerate
research and development of vaccines and therapeutics, and take other critical
steps to scale up the public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The
Solidarity Trial will test four different drugs or combinations:
Remdesivir Lopinavir Ritonavir Interferon Beta (Chloroquine)
Remdesivir
works by inhibiting a specific enzyme, RNA polymerase, which normally allows
the virus to replicate. Without that enzyme, the virus becomes less able to
maintain its hold on the body.
Ritonavir
and lopinavir are two compounds that doctors administer together as
antiretroviral therapy — the therapy that treats HIV infections.
Interferon-beta,
a compound doctors use as first-line therapy in the treatment of multiple
sclerosis.
The
trial — called MIRACLE (Middle East respiratory syndrome with a combination of
lopinavir/ritonavir and interferon-β1b Trial) — is currently testing this
experimental treatment with the consent of MERS patients.
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