Experimental Drug Tested At Emory Could Fight Against Coronavirus

ATLANTA, GA — A clinical trial led by Emory University Hospital researchers could be a potential treatment for the new coronavirus, which causes COVID-19. Dr. Anthony Fauci, with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases shared his optimism about the trial.

“The data shows that remdesivir has a clear-cut, significant, positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery,” he said in a public statement.

The National Institutes of Health released the findings Wednesday afternoon.

Emory University has played a leading role in the government-sponsored clinical trial of the COVID-19 drug remdesivir – enrolling more patients in the study than any other site, according to researchers.

According to preliminary data from the trial, hospitalized patients with advanced COVID-19 and lung involvement who received remdesivir recovered faster than similar patients who received placebo.

The randomized, controlled trial involved 1,063 patients and began on Feb. 21.

The trial is known as the Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial, or ACTT, and sponsored by the NIAID. A total of 68 sites joined the study, 47 in the United States and 21 in countries in Europe and Asia.

Emory and an affiliated hospital enrolled 103 patients, more than any other institution in the world.

“This is an important development,” Dr. Aneesh Mehta, Emory University Hospital’s chief of infectious diseases services, tells WSB.

Preliminary results indicate that patients who received remdesivir had a 31 percent faster recovery time than those who received placebo, according to NIAID. On average, the recovery time was 11 days for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who received placebo.

An independent data and safety monitoring board (DSMB) overseeing the trial met on April 27 to review data and shared their interim analysis with the study team. They noted that remdesivir was better than placebo from the perspective of the primary endpoint, time to recovery, a metric often used in influenza trials.

Recovery in this study was defined as being well enough for hospital discharge or returning to normal activity level.

Remdesivir, developed by Gilead Sciences Inc., is an investigational broad-spectrum antiviral treatment administered via daily infusion for 10 days. It has shown promise in animal models for treating SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) infection and has been examined in various clinical trials, according to Emory.

The drug works by blocking the virus’ ability to make more of itself, according to doctors.

The treatment isn’t a vaccine, researchers said.

“Remdesivir is the first therapeutic, the first medication to show a positive effect with patients with COVID-19,” Mehta said.