Study: Anti-parasitic drug can kills coronavirus within 48 hours in lab grown cells!
By: Team Ifairer | Posted: 05-04-2020
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Researchers have found that an anti-parasitic drug already available around the world can kill the novel coronavirus grown in cell cultures within 48 hours, an advance that may lead to the development and trial of a new clinical therapy for COVID-19. According to the study, published in the journal Antiviral Research, the drug, Ivermectin, stopped the virus, SARS-CoV-2, from growing in cell culture within 48 hours.
"We found that even a single dose could essentially remove all viral RNA by 48 hours and that even at 24 hours there was a really significant reduction in it," said study co-author Kylie Wagstaff from Monash University in Australia. The scientists said Ivermectin is an approved anti-parasitic drug that has also been shown to be effective in vitro against a broad range of viruses including HIV, Dengue, Influenza and Zika virus.
However, Wagstaff cautioned that the tests conducted in the study were in vitro and that trials needed to be carried out in people. "Ivermectin is very widely used and seen as a safe drug. We need to figure out now whether the dosage you can use it at in humans will be effective - that's the next step," Wagstaff said.