The Lemon Fool

I've seen a few news reports recently about a new drug Molnupiravir (a "miracle drug" according to some tabloid articles because halves the risk of hospitalisation in infected patients). Apparently the UK has ordered 480 courses [ Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... for-winter ].

For anyone who has been trying to follow some of the science I thought I'd post a link to a 14 minute video that covers the mechanism of action, some trial results showing that halving of hospitalisation risk, and also goes into some discussions of potential longer term side effects at the end (which to be honest seem a bit concerning to me but this stuff is way outside my area of expertise so one has to hope that some very smart and well-informed people, including those from the regulatory agencies, have looked very deeply into that final aspect of the drug). Perhaps it will be reserved only for those with significant risk factors.

The video is here...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aI0xGfI ... nedCLEARLY

- Julian

Julian wrote:Apparently the UK has ordered 480 courses

From the article there's a few 0 missing off that

I like the name they've chosen

- sd

please read this link

https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/d ... .202001807

i search it in scholar google

i don't comment because of the the inquisition

look wrote:please read this link

https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/d ... .202001807

i search it in scholar google

i don't comment because of the the inquisition

Could you explain what you mean by the last sentence here please?

chas49 wrote:

look wrote:please read this link

https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/d ... .202001807

i search it in scholar google

i don't comment because of the the inquisition

Could you explain what you mean by the last sentence here please?

last night i posted about this issue and others and the post was deleted.

look wrote:

chas49 wrote:

look wrote:please read this link

https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/d ... .202001807

i search it in scholar google

i don't comment because of the the inquisition

Could you explain what you mean by the last sentence here please?

last night i posted about this issue and others and the post was deleted.

Nobody expects that...!

Google says that there are a few trials in progress for acetylcysteine, but the results are not great in completed trials:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8191712/

servodude wrote:

Julian wrote:Apparently the UK has ordered 480 courses

From the article there's a few 0 missing off that

I like the name they've chosen

- sd

Ooops. Thanks for the correction.

- Julian

Midsmartin wrote:Google says that there are a few trials in progress for acetylcysteine, but the results are not great in completed trials:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8191712/

the trial of this link was not fair. They gave the medicine only during 3 days and mesure the effects 28 days after.

look wrote:

Midsmartin wrote:Google says that there are a few trials in progress for acetylcysteine, but the results are not great in completed trials:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8191712/

the trial of this link was not fair. They gave the medicine only during 3 days and mesure the effects 28 days after.

To be fair to that study:

"Conclusions
Our pilot study did not support the potential benefits of intravenous NAC in treating patients with COVID-19-associated ARDS. More studies are needed to determine which COVID-19 patients benefit from the NAC administration."

i think there is no honest reason to give such a medicine only during 3 days. As a comparison, in trial regarding flu in another trial they give it during 6 months. It's in the link that i provided.

it's not a medicine with sharp colateral effects to justify to give only during 3 days.

this trial has no value, the bad intention is obvius.

look wrote:i think there is no honest reason to give such a medicine only during 3 days. As a comparison, in trial regarding flu in another trial they give it during 6 months. It's in the link that i provided.

it's not a medicine with sharp colateral effects to justify to give only during 3 days.

this trial has no value, the bad intention is obvius.

Do you mean this flu trial

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9230243/

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of long-term treatment with NAC on influenza and influenza-like episodes. A total of 262 subjects of both sexes (78% > or = 65 yrs, and 62% suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases) were enrolled in a randomized, double-blind trial involving 20 Italian Centres. They were randomized to receive either placebo or NAC tablets (600 mg) twice daily for 6 months. Patients suffering from chronic respiratory diseases were not eligible, to avoid possible confounding by an effect of NAC on respiratory symptoms. NAC treatment was well tolerated and resulted in a significant decrease in the frequency of influenza-like episodes, severity, and length of time confined to bed.

That was a long term study involving patients suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases and looking at whether the drug reduced the severity of any flu that they caught during that long period. The Covid trial in contrast was with people who were already infected with Covid.

ursaminortaur wrote:

look wrote:i think there is no honest reason to give such a medicine only during 3 days. As a comparison, in trial regarding flu in another trial they give it during 6 months. It's in the link that i provided.

it's not a medicine with sharp colateral effects to justify to give only during 3 days.

this trial has no value, the bad intention is obvius.

Do you mean this flu trial

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9230243/

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of long-term treatment with NAC on influenza and influenza-like episodes. A total of 262 subjects of both sexes (78% > or = 65 yrs, and 62% suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases) were enrolled in a randomized, double-blind trial involving 20 Italian Centres. They were randomized to receive either placebo or NAC tablets (600 mg) twice daily for 6 months. Patients suffering from chronic respiratory diseases were not eligible, to avoid possible confounding by an effect of NAC on respiratory symptoms. NAC treatment was well tolerated and resulted in a significant decrease in the frequency of influenza-like episodes, severity, and length of time confined to bed.

That was a long term study involving patients suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases and looking at whether the drug reduced the severity of any flu that they caught during that long period. The Covid trial in contrast was with people who were already infected with Covid.

Probably it was this trial that i read. When i wrote "it's in the link i provided" i was refering to the fact that in the NAC trial they give it only during 3 days. For me, this is enough to consider this trial biased.

The flu trial shows that the drug is not so terrible that you can give it only during 3 days.

look wrote:

ursaminortaur wrote:

look wrote:i think there is no honest reason to give such a medicine only during 3 days. As a comparison, in trial regarding flu in another trial they give it during 6 months. It's in the link that i provided.

it's not a medicine with sharp colateral effects to justify to give only during 3 days.

this trial has no value, the bad intention is obvius.

Do you mean this flu trial

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9230243/

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of long-term treatment with NAC on influenza and influenza-like episodes. A total of 262 subjects of both sexes (78% > or = 65 yrs, and 62% suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases) were enrolled in a randomized, double-blind trial involving 20 Italian Centres. They were randomized to receive either placebo or NAC tablets (600 mg) twice daily for 6 months. Patients suffering from chronic respiratory diseases were not eligible, to avoid possible confounding by an effect of NAC on respiratory symptoms. NAC treatment was well tolerated and resulted in a significant decrease in the frequency of influenza-like episodes, severity, and length of time confined to bed.

That was a long term study involving patients suffering from nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases and looking at whether the drug reduced the severity of any flu that they caught during that long period. The Covid trial in contrast was with people who were already infected with Covid.

Probably it was this trial that i read. When i wrote "it's in the link i provided" i was refering to the fact that in the NAC trial they give it only during 3 days. For me, this is enough to consider this trial biased.

The flu trial shows that the drug is not so terrible that you can give it only during 3 days.

It was in the link you provided as a link in the References section at the end ("16 De Flora S, Grassi C, Carati L. Attenuation of influenza-like symptomatology and improvement of cell-mediated immunity with long-term N-acetylcysteine treatment.")

The difference is because the aims of the two trials are so different. One is about reducing the seriousness* of influenza in those suffering from other nonrespiratory chronic degenerative diseases and is so long because you need to allow time for a sufficient number to become infected with flu (and it wouldn't be ethical to infect such patients with influenza). The other trial is looking at whether the antiviral helps with people who are already infected with coronavirus and showing moderate symptoms and thus can be much shorter.

* Which if the drug was very effective might even significantly reduce the number who showed any symptoms of influenza at all compared to the control group.

Two interesting findings

https://todayuknews.com/health/the-full ... ber-study/

https://todayuknews.com/health/potentia ... dentified/

Posted on this thread as the latter is an antiviral candidate.

Another promising looking antiviral just made the news today...

A pill to treat Covid developed by the US company Pfizer cuts the risk of hospitalisation or death by 89% in vulnerable adults, clinical trial results suggest.

The drug - Paxlovid - is intended for use soon after symptoms develop in people at high risk of severe disease.

It comes a day after the UK medicines regulator approved a similar treatment from Merck Sharp and Dohme (MSD).

Pfizer says it stopped trials early as the initial results were so positive.

The UK has already ordered 250,000 courses of the new Pfizer treatment, which has not yet been approved, along with another 480,000 courses of MSD's molnupiravir pill.

[ Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-59178291 ]

Molnupiravir was the one I posted about at the start of this thread. Potentially this one looks even better if the trial results translate into observed results across a wider patient population.

For additional info here is the Pfizer release with a bit more detail - https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-relea ... -candidate

- Julian