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Japan approves remdesivir for coronavirus treatment

26 Comments
By Ulrich Perrey

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Good!!!!

Bring on the Avigan too.

-3 ( +6 / -9 )

This drugs are good for the older people but for younger generation they are not advisable since they can affect fetal as is written up n the article.

4 ( +6 / -2 )

Side effects need to be weighed...

8 ( +9 / -1 )

Good luck with that.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Doesn’t decrease the death rate.

2 ( +8 / -6 )

Gilead have just donated it's total stock, capable of treating around 200,000 patients to US patients, though who will get them is not known. Priority - healthcare workers or VIPs? Donated = Free of Charge. Will take a while to build up more supplies, so don't expect any here for a while, unless it is manufactured under licence. Gilead are looking for manufacturers around the world, e.g. India to assist making it, but some of the chemicals used to synthesise it are also in short supply.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Hope I don't get infectec with this virus and be in a situation that I am left with no choice but accept being a guinea pig for this deathly drugs.

1 ( +4 / -3 )

2 studies from Europe, Spain and France came out on May 5th with really good results in a significant drop in death rates for patients in the EARLY stages of COVID-19 who received hydroxychloroquine.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

As stated it was for emergency use. The emergency situation that they may have in mind is when the healthcare system starts to get overwhelmed. The shortening of recovery time will help in that situation.

Also, this drug could be secondary only to avigan and used only where avigan is contrainficated

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Dr. Anthony Fauci didnt immediately discredit it like he does with every other single thing.

Plus the Q1 investors meeting for the stock was coming up.

Why was it approved ...?

2 ( +3 / -1 )

it has been admitted this doesn't prevent patient's death, however it is good at destroying kidneys in 60% of cases and 100 times the price of the other medicine used (hydroxychloroquin).

Why was it approved ...?

Because it is useful.

Even if it does not prevent death on the patients of the study (which were in a very serious situation to begin with) that does not mean that same results will be obtained when used before this serious condition is reached. The kidneys are not destroyed, and impairment in function is gradual and easy to keep in check with laboratory so any person that shows renal problems can be taken out of medication immediately.

The main advantage is that it reduce the time a patient needs to be hospitalized very importantly. If the main problem with covid-19 is that it can saturate the health services then anything that can free the resources for the next patient is extremely beneficial.

Anything that shows a positive effect in the patients is to be preferred, hydroxychloroquine can be cheaper, but if it is of no benefit (or even it is detrimental because of its toxicity) that is of no importance.

And the same as with every other medical treatment all patients have the right to refuse it for whatever reason and doctors cannot use it without consent of the patient. Anybody that prefers to risk the disease is free to do it.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

The cheapest and best cure for the virus is the one developed for the first time in Italy last month, a cure that everybody are trying to hide from media and keep far from government representatives, and it is represented by the plasma donated by the patients that successfully recovered from the virus. Recovered patients donate some blood for free before leaving the hospital; the blood is purified, the plasma is extracted, treated and prepared for transfusion into the positive people at high risk. People get better and completely over the virus also in 48 hours, depending on the condition and the case.

Nobody wanna talk about it, because there is no pharmaceutical company involved, no artificial drug to produce and speculate on, no possible monopoly or economical control... because it is a process that can be activated and executed virtually by any hospital. And since it has been developed by an equipe in a public hospital and not by a university or a medical company, nobody wants to accept it. There is virtually no cost on it. Only the running expenses of the machinery and the personnel to prepare the blood and transfuse it.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

It was developed by Mantova hospital doctors equipe... check it out.

https://www.thepatent.news/2020/05/04/coronavirus-plasma-therapy/

2 ( +2 / -0 )

This decision is "criminal". As it's written in the article: "The difference in mortality rate was not statistically significant". But we know for a fact that Remdesivir has terrible side effects such as permanent kidney damages and many others. Studies consider these damages from 25% to 60% of people who receive the treatment. Remdesivir is an antiviral and as few people knows it , the Covid 19 disappear from your body after the first stage of your infection : people don't die of the virus itself and usually virus isn't anymore in your system when you are in a severe stage (you get in a severe stage because your antibodies reaction to the virus becomes so strong, then you have pulmonary infection etc etc). So, as Remdesivir is given to people in advance stage, IT HAS ABSOLUTELY NO EFFECT (as the virus is not effective anymore at this stage) as it's designed as an antiviral only! Japanese government and US government approved Remdesivir as they want people to believe that they're doing something to stop the disaster, but it has NO EFFECT as studies shows it.

The current only way to stop the virus and people dying is to give hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin (an antibiotic) at the beginning of the treatment which will reduce the viral charge from the very beginning (when people show first symptoms). It's "criminal" to say to people "go back home and only contact us if it get worse, because THEN IT'S TOO LATE. Every people who shows symptoms and who get tested should be given immediately hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin. And people in advance stage (if they weren't given Remdesivir at the beginning) should be give antibiotics and even hydroxychloroquine to fight the infection they're suffering from and this poisonous Remdesivir.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

Treatments with hydroxychloroquine have been associated with significantly higher death rates than than treatments without it.

Overall, patients treated with hydroxychloroquine alone experienced a death rate of 27.8%. Patients treated with hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin had a death rate of 22.1%, and patients receiving neither treatment had a death rate of 11.4%. The risk of ventilation was similar for all three groups.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Ivermectin as claimed by Monash University study that a single dose of this anti parasite medicine can stop Covid 19 virus growing in the cell culture and kill it within 48 hrs inside the body.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

..the plasma donated by the patients that successfully recovered from the virus. Recovered patients donate some blood for free before leaving the hospital; the blood is purified, the plasma is extracted, treated and prepared for transfusion into the positive people at high risk. 

Trials are also underway in many countries. Hopefully it will be as effective as with other diseases

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Get ready for the slough of lawsuits a decade down the road, if not sooner, getting thrown out of court by the Japanese judges because, "The Government at the time, while having rushed this treatment through, could not have possibly known that the side-effects would be so severe while not having any effect on the virus it was supposed to be helping to fight. As such, we find the government not guilty, but realize the suffering of the patients and the government must pay a sum of ¥1 million to be divided among the 1000 patients named in the lawsuit."

2 ( +3 / -1 )

The new thalidomide.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

The cheapest and best cure for the virus is the one developed for the first time in Italy last month, a cure that everybody are trying to hide from media and keep far from government representatives, and it is represented by the plasma donated by the patients that successfully recovered from the virus

Using plasma is not cheap and it is not particularly safe, it is very resource consuming to collect, store and use plasma in an sterile manner, and requires a lot of expensive testing to make sure that it does not contain any other pathogens that will be transmitted during the transfusion. Even so it is not practical to test for everything, so the risk of infecting the patient with something always remain, and some patients can show very strong rejection of the plasma that can even put in danger their lives. And finally you can only get 2 doses from one single patient (and then wait for a month) so it can never be mass produced.

That is why it remains only as a secondary resource, there is no conspiracy, just medical realities. If you only want a treatment for rich patients plasma is enough, but for the general population better options are required.

 people don't die of the virus itself and usually virus isn't anymore in your system when you are in a severe stage (you get in a severe stage because your antibodies reaction to the virus becomes so strong, then you have pulmonary infection etc etc). 

That is false, scientific reports are clear, patients that have high viral titers persistently are the ones that have a much worse disease severity, the immune system react against the viral antigens, so if the virus disappears this immune reaction also stops.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1473309920302322

but it has NO EFFECT as studies shows it.

Again, this is not true, it does have an effect even on serious cases, as reported.

The current only way to stop the virus and people dying is to give hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin

The evidence for this is still tenuous, the better the studies are the lower the treatment effects are, this indicate that even if it is in anyway useful it would only be in a very limited way. Also, if your argument is that the drug has to be given early, that is exactly where Remdesivir has shown better results.

Ivermectin as claimed by Monash University study that a single dose of this anti parasite medicine can stop Covid 19 virus growing in the cell culture and kill it within 48 hrs inside the body.

No, it can kill the virus in the cell culture, not inside the body, that has not been even tested yet.

There are hundreds of compounds that work against the virus in cells, but that only rarely is the same when tried in animal models, and even more when tried in humans. Once a drug advances to clinical trials there is reason to become optimistic, but results in cells are like buying one lottery ticket.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Even so it is not practical to test for everything, so the risk of infecting the patient with something always remain, and some patients can show very strong rejection of the plasma that can even put in danger their lives. 

Just cut the post for brevity but for all the reasons you mentioned will plasma transfusion be considered as a treatment of last resort (always) then?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Just cut the post for brevity but for all the reasons you mentioned will plasma transfusion be considered as a treatment of last resort (always) then?

Not exactly as a last resort, but something that can only be used in very limited situations and with strong risk of complication, so never as the first line of treatment.

Freedom of speech and opinion is important but I think you didn't inform yourself properly on the drugs used and their effect in the studies ... Entirely wrong

There are already reviews for its effect, and for the moment is mediocre. Taking in account the toxicity and negative side effects of the drug it is difficult to think it will be ever a first choice for treatment.

Therefore it is perfectly possible that will end up being an option that offers no benefit, this is not something that goes against current evidence.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Better this one than Avigan sounds like Abegun in Japanglish.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

virusrex

May 8  10:13 pm JST

Just cut the post for brevity but for all the reasons you mentioned will plasma transfusion be considered as a treatment of last resort (always) then?

Not exactly as a last resort, but something that can only be used in very limited situations and with strong risk of complication, so never as the first line of treatment.

Thanks!

1 ( +1 / -0 )

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