SALT LAKE CITY – A drug used as an antidepressant has now also helped patients with COVID-19 recover from the virus, small studies showed.
Researchers at the University of Utah Health believe the drug works and are now conducting research with a larger study to confirm the remarkable results of two previous studies.
The generic drug, fluvoxamine, was developed 40 years ago as an antidepressant, primarily to treat obsessive-compulsive disorder. It’s safe, costs only $ 0.60 per pill, and shows great promise.
“We need a drug that prevents people from getting sick when they get COVID, and that’s what we hope fluvoxamine will do,” said Dr. Adam Spivak, assistant professor in the Department of Infectious Diseases at the University of Utah Health.
Researchers have spent a year trying to find that pill since the start of the pandemic. Spivak said fluvoxamine could be that treatment.
“That’s a huge hole in our arsenal,” he said. “We have spent a lot of time thinking about vaccines these days. We want to prevent the disease. But people still get COVID, and they will until we vaccinate enough people.”
After a year of learning about the virus, researchers now believe that people get so sick, and not the virus itself, but the human response to the virus.
“There is a massive inflammatory response that causes people to get sick and end up in the hospital,” said Spivak.
Could a 40-year-old antidepressant be a possible treatment for COVID-19?
Researchers have found that the drug fluvoxamine appears to prevent some of the complications of the disease and makes hospitalization and the need for supplemental oxygen less likely. https://t.co/fHhASCk7wd
– Washington University in St. Louis (@WUSTL) March 19, 2021
They think fluvoxamine tackles that inflammatory response because it has anti-inflammatory properties. Therefore, psychiatrists at Washington University in St. Louis decided to test fluvoxamine on COVID-19 patients.
In one trial, they gave fluvoxamine to 150 people with confirmed COVID-19. Of those who received the placebo, 8% ended up in hospital.
Spivak said, “Eighty people got the fluvoxamine, and none of those people got any sicker. They all recovered.”
At about the 10 day point, people taking fluvoxamine had largely recovered.
–Dr. Adam Spivak, Assistant Professor, Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Utah Health
In November, there were similar results in a field trial following a COVID-19 outbreak at a California racetrack.
“By about 10 days, the people taking fluvoxamine had largely recovered,” said Spivak.
The University of Utah researchers are part of a larger, multi-site trial called Stop COVID 2 that aims to enroll 1,100 people. You must be at least 30 and have confirmed COVID-19 with symptoms that started within the past six days.
“We hope to get this done as soon as possible so we can either confirm that fluvoxamine works and have it in our arsenal, or know that it doesn’t,” said Spivak.
The researchers conducted the entire trial remotely, shipping drugs and trial supplies to the participants. It doesn’t matter where you live to join.
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Jed Boal