Nat Microbiol: New discoveries by Chinese scientists! Antimicrobials or promising treatments for SARS-CoV-2 infections!

Oct 15, 2020 // -- In a recent study published in the international journal Nature Microbiology, scientists from the University of Hong Kong and others in China found that an affordable antimicrobial drug used to treat stomach ulcers and bacterial infections may be able to fight coronavirus infections in animals. in the
article, the researchers wanted to delve deeper into whether the metal drug has antiviral properties to fight SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, a special compound containing metals commonly used to fight bacterial infections.
used Syrian hamsters as a target, the researchers found that one of the drugs, called RBC, ranitidine bismuth citrate, could be used as a potential anti-SARS-CoV-2 infection agent.
Photo Source: Dr. Runming Wang, a researcher at CC0 Public Domain, says RBC can reduce viral loads in the lungs of subject animals tenfold, and the study found that it may be a potential antiviral agent for COVID-19, which has killed more than a million people worldwide since December.
as scientists struggle to find a vaccine, they are also looking for existing drugs to relieve symptoms of COVID-19 infection or to help patients progress against viral infections.
broad-spectrum antiviral drug Redsyvir and a class of corticosteroids called dexamisong have both been shown to be successful against SARS-CoV-2 infections, both of which are now used by doctors to treat infections in patients; There are some drawbacks to the drug, first of all, redsivir is expensive and is currently lacking globally, while dexamisson has immunosuppressive effects on patients, which pose a risk to the treatment of other patients in addition to the patients with the most severe symptoms of the disease.
Of course, liver damage from other drug mixes may also carry some therapeutic risk, and the researchers say RBC is a commonly used drug for stomach ulcers, with safe and comprehensive pharmacological characteristics that have been in use for decades, so it is very safe, and later researchers will explore whether other metal drugs can also successfully fight viral infections and eventually treat patients.
() Original source: Yuan, S., Wang, R., Chan, J.F. et al. Metallodrug ranitidine bismuth citrate suppresses SARS-CoV-2 replication and eases virus-associated pneumonia in Syrian hamsters. Nat Microbiol (2020). doi:10.1038/s41564-020-00802-x.