Merck announced Friday that an experimental COVID pill it has developed reduced hospitalizations and deaths by 50% in people recently infected with COVID.
The company will soon ask health officials in the US and abroad to authorize use of the drug.
The news came as a welcome surprise to the public, although COVID cases are already waning in the US and in hard-hit economies in Asia, the drug could create “a real therapeutic advance” that could dramatically decrease the risk of death from COVID.
If approved (and odds are it will be) the drug would be the first treatment for COVID. Some compared it to tamiflu, in that patients should take it within 5 days of COVID infection (like those infected with the flu are instructed to take tamiflu early).
Former FDA Director Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC that the trial results are clearly “profoundly” positive, even though researchers decided to stop the trial early because the drug showed significant success, meaning it would be unethical to keep giving patients placebos.
To test the drug, they needed to test more than 700 unvaccinated people in a global study. The people were all considered in the “high risk” category due to factors like age, and other characteristics from their “health profile”....<<<Read More>>>...