Antidepressant Drug Shows Promise In Treating Covid-19, Study Finds
Source: Washington Post
A common drug used to treat depression, fluvoxamine, has shown promise in the treatment of early covid-19, scientists said. The research was published in the Lancet Global Health journal on Wednesday and based off a large clinical trial that took place across 11 cities in Brazil from January to August.
It looked at high-risk symptomatic Brazilian adults who had covid-19 and were at risk of severe illness because of other health problems. The research found that "treatment with fluvoxamine (100 mg twice daily for 10 days) among high-risk outpatients with early diagnosed COVID-19 reduced the need for hospitalisation."
Just under 1,500 individuals took part in the trial -- about half of whom received the drug and the other half a placebo. The average age of participants was 50, and almost 60 percent were women, according to the study. The participants were tracked for four weeks and took the pills for 10 days while at home.
In the group that took the drug, 11 percent needed hospitalization or an extended emergency room stay, compared to 16 percent of those who took the placebo. "[Fluvoxamine] could be one of our most powerful weapons against the virus," said study co-author Edward Mills of McMaster University in Ontario in August...
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2021/10/28/antidepressant-fluvoxamine-coronavirus-lancet/
- ETA: 'Vaccine eligibility for mood disorders underscores elevated covid risk,' Wash. Post, Oct. 27, 2021,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/mental-disorder-cdc-covid-eligibility/2021/10/27/2a45eea0-32ae-11ec-9241-aad8e48f01ff_story.html
..When the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention added mood disorders to the list of conditions that put people at high risk for severe covid-19 recently, clinicians were not surprised. The mind-body connection, they say, is long-settled research.. But the scientific seal of approval is still critical: It makes millions of people eligible for booster shots based on their mental health diagnosis alone and gives vulnerable groups more reason to protect themselves...
- More, https://www.democraticunderground.com/100215991888
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- CNN 'Cheap, generic anti-depressant may reduce severe Covid-19 disease, study finds,' Oct. 28, 2021. - Ed.
A cheap, generically available anti-depressant may reduce the risk of severe Covid-19 disease by close to a third in people at high risk, researchers reported Wednesday. The drug, sold under the brand name Luvox, is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) most often used to treat obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) & depression. But it can affect inflammation, said Dr. Angela Reiersen at Washington University in St. Louis who worked on the study...
"Fluvoxamine may reduce the production of inflammatory molecules called cytokines, that can be triggered by SARS-CoV-2 infection.".. The drug may also reduce blood platelets, which may affect the clotting effects of coronavirus infection. Reierson and colleagues gave 741 volunteers with Covid-19 100 mg of fluvoxamine twice a day for 10 days while 756 volunteers got a placebo.
It's not a cure, but if the drug can help keep patients out of the hospital, it would be useful.
"Given fluvoxamine's safety, tolerability, ease of use, low cost, & widespread availability, these findings might influence national & international guidelines on the clinical management of COVID-19," they concluded. A related drug, Prozac, or fluoxetine, is also cheap & even more widely available, & the researchers said this drug should be studied to see if it might help. It wasn't a perfect study, they noted. It was done in Brazil, & the patients had a higher rate of hospitalization than Covid-19 patients in other clinical trials...
https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/28/health/fluvoxamine-covid-risk-study/index.html
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