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Repositioning Antiviral Drugs as a Rapid and Cost-Effective Approach to Discover Treatment against SARS-CoV-2 Infection
Published in Hajiya Mairo Inuwa, Ifeoma Maureen Ezeonu, Charles Oluwaseun Adetunji, Emmanuel Olufemi Ekundayo, Abubakar Gidado, Abdulrazak B. Ibrahim, Benjamin Ewa Ubi, Medical Biotechnology, Biopharmaceutics, Forensic Science and Bioinformatics, 2022
Omotayo Opemipo Oyedara, Folasade Muibat Adeyemi, Charles Oluwaseun Adetunji, Temidayo Oluyomi Elufisan
Favipiravir was recently approved in Japan under the brand name Avigan. It is active against different strains of influenza virus, including antiviral-resistant strains. It functions by interfering with the activity of the viral RNA polymerase (Furuta et al. 2005). In a multicentre randomized study, administration of favipiravir was suggested to reduce the length of hospital stay and the need to oxygenate COVID-19 patients (Dabbous et al. 2020). In another multicentre phase III clinical study, Udwadia et al. (2021) reported that clinical signs and symptoms in COVID-19 patients may be reduced with early administration of oral favipiravir. High dosage of favipiravir has been suggested to be required to achieve significant antiviral effects in COVID-19 patients (Dauby et al. 2021). However, some studies have linked the application of favipiravir to liver injury (Yamazaki et al. 2021), nephrotoxicity (Nasa et al. 2021), and pancreatitis (Khan et al. 2021) in COVID-19 patients. Favipiravir was also reported to cure two COVID-19 patients effectively in combination with corticosteroid and other interventions such as extracorporeal membrane oxygenation and mechanical ventilation (Shinoda et al. 2021).
Epidemiology, Pharmacology, Diagnosis, and Treatment of COVID-19
Published in Joystu Dutta, Srijan Goswami, Abhijit Mitra, COVID-19 and Emerging Environmental Trends, 2020
Joystu Dutta, Srijan Goswami, Abhijit Mitra
Favipiravir – It is an antiviral agent that acts by selectively inhibiting RNA polymerase essential for the viral replication. This drug is used for the treatment of influenza in Japan. Favipiravir is currently under clinical trial for COVID-19 (Reuters, 2020) (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT04359615).
COVID-19: a pandemic challenging healthcare systems
Published in IISE Transactions on Healthcare Systems Engineering, 2021
Lidong Wang, Cheryl Ann Alexander
Researchers have pursued multiple, potential therapeutics for treating COVID-19 such as Remdesivir, chloroquine/hydroxychloroquine, neuraminidase inhibitors, umifenovir, lopinavir/ritonavir nucleoside analogues, DNA synthesis inhibitors, Favipiravir, and Chinese traditional medicines (TCM) (e.g. Lianhua Qing-wen capsules or ShuFeng JieDu). Studies have demonstrated that chloroquine has in vitro effects on the inhibition of uncoating and/or alteration of post-translational modifications of newly synthesized proteins. A recent study demonstrated that chloroquine and Remdesivir could successfully control COVID-19 in vitro (Lai et al., 2020). Favipiravir mimics both A and G nucleotides for RNA synthesis (Peng et al., 2021). Remdesivir (GS-5734) is a nucleoside inhibitor and has the greatest potential as a drug candidate for treating COVID-19. Remdesivir is a monophosphoramide prodrug, leading to the premature end of viral RNA replication. It was initially developed to treat SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV, and Ebola (Kakodkar et al., 2020).
Role of S&T organisations in mitigation of Covid-19: CSIR as a case study
Published in Indian Chemical Engineer, 2020
Geetha Vani Rayasam, Shekhar C. Mande
Favipiravir, which is an antiviral, RNA Polymerase inhibitor and has been marketed in Russia, China, Japan, and is an approved treatment of influenza, is a high priority in repurposing drugs. Clinical trials conducted by Glenmark have shown that Favipiravir offers a rapid reduction in viral load within four days and provides faster symptomatic and radiological improvement and has shown clinical improvement of up to 88% in Covid-19 mild to moderate Covid-19 cases on mild to moderate Covid-19 patients during clinical trials. The advantage of Favipiravir is it is a generic drug and is orally administered. CSIR-IICT developed a cost-effective synthetic process for Favipiravir and transferred the technology to Cipla. Recently Favipiravir has been given emergency approval in India and Glenmark launched the drug in the market originally priced at Rs 100/tablet. Subsequently, Cipla based on the process technology of CSIR undertook the manufacturing of Favipiravir and launched Favipiravir under the brand name Ciplenza at a cost about 30% lower than the original Glenmark price. Currently, many companies have launched Favipiravir increasing the availability and making the drug affordable too.
Activity analysis of new N-heterocyclic carbenes and silver N-heterocyclic carbene molecules against novel coronavirus by UV-vis, fluorescence spectroscopy and molecular docking
Published in Journal of Coordination Chemistry, 2021
Elvan Üstün, Namık Özdemir, Neslihan Şahin
Human coronavirus was first identified in the mid-1960s [1]. Coronavirus belongs to the Coronaviridae family, which is an enveloped single stranded-positive sense RNA virus [2]. Coronaviridae family is divided into four subgroups as alpha, beta, gamma, and theta [3]. Alpha and beta Coronaviridae usually infect mammals and humans, while gamma and theta usually infect birds [4]. Novel coronavirus (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2: SARS CoV-2) is a beta virus [5]. Novel coronavirus first appeared in China and has spread rapidly all over the world and transmits through the human body by the nose, mouth, and eyes [6]. There have been 253,163,330 confirmed cases of Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19), including 5,098,174 deaths, reported by World Health Organization (WHO) (November 15, 2021) [7]. The researchers concentrated on vaccine studies for fighting against the novel coronavirus. On the other hand, patients have been treated by previously used molecules such as hydroxychloroquine, ribavirin, and favipiravir, whose antiviral activities were known for some diseases [8]. Hydroxychloroquine is an FDA-approved drug used for malaria [9]. Studies confirmed that hydroxychloroquine inhibits the SARS CoV-2 virus by changing the pH of the cell membrane surface. In addition, hydroxychloroquine also inhibits the glycosylation of the viral proteins and nucleic acid replication [10]. Ribavirin is a guanosine analogue antiviral agent against DNA and RNA viruses, which was accepted for medical applications in 1986. It is one of the drugs used in the treatment of hepatitis C. Ribavirin is also used in Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and hantavirus infections [11]. Favipiravir is a well-known anti-viral molecule and inhibits some DNA and RNA viruses [12].