Heartburn Remedies For Coronavirus? Doctors test famotidine
In the ongoing fight against COVID-19, new and well-known drugs are being examined almost daily as potential treatment methods against the corona pandemic. Researchers in New York want to find out whether the active ingredient of an over-the-counter heartburn medication has a positive effect on the disease.
Heartburn Drug as Possible Covid-19 Treatment?
Researchers at the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, a division of Northwell Health in New York City that operates 23 different hospitals in the state, are investigating famotidine, the active ingredient in the drug pepcid, as a possible treatment for coronavirus. The drug is being investigated in a small hospital clinical trial along with other studies of more well-known potential treatment options for COVID-19, including Gilead Sciences' remedesivir and the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine. At the weekend, the hospital said that 187 COVID-19 patients had received intravenous doses of famotidine, the journal reported Science.
According to the CNN, all patients in the Northwell study are taking hydroxychloroquine. Half of the patients in the study also received famotidine. A placebo is added to the other half. Given the recent guidelines from the US Food and Drug Administration regarding the side effects of hydroxychloroquine, the hospital may no longer use this drug in the study, CNN said. Last Friday, researchers announced that they had canceled a study to test the malaria drug chloroquine as a potential treatment for Covid-19 after some patients developed serious or life-threatening irregular heartbeat and died almost two dozen after daily use.
Famotidine is believed to bind to a key enzyme for COVID-19. The US hospital began investigating the potential benefits against the pandemic, according to reports from China and the results of the molecular modeling, said Science. Dr. Michael Callahan, an infectious disease specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital, had been in China when the COVID-19 first broke out and provided his expertise to the Chinese government.
After comparing patients who died from COVID-19 to those who survived, the research team in Wuhan, China, found that many of the survivors were taking medications for chronic heartburn. The patients had taken the drug pepcid, the active ingredient of which is famotidine. More expensive gastric acid blockers like Prilosec (with the active ingredient omeprazole) do not use famotidine, science found. The COVID-19 patients who took Prilosec, who also tended to be wealthier, did not have the same survival rate, the report said. In China, hospitalized COVID-19 patients who took famotidine appeared to die at a rate of about 14%, compared to 27% for those who did not take the drug, reported Science. The magazine added that the analysis is rough and the results are not statistically significant.
Experts warn of premature conclusions
Even though the study results may not have been statistically significant, they were a solid foundation to start exploring the idea. Northwell received approval from the FDA to conduct a study on the intravenous version of the active ingredient famotidine. The intravenous doses are much higher than the dose strengths in the over-the-counter version of the heartburn remedy taken orally. If it works, the researchers will know in a few weeks.
It took a long time for the research team to secure enough of the intravenous doses for their famotidine study. The hospital did not want to announce its goal too early and cause drug shortages, as was the case with the hype surrounding the potential of hydroxychloroquine. Dr. Kevin Tracey, president of the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, warned that individuals are storming US stores to buy large amounts of pepcid. He is also concerned that people who do not have heartburn will buy famotidine tablets by mistaken belief that it will help against coronavirus. It is still unclear whether it will work, and if there are panic purchases, its research team may not have enough for their study participants.
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