Abstract

Background: A pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-2019) has shattered the globe with no prophylactic vaccine or anti-SARS-CoV-2 medication inducing a morbidity of more than 75 million patients and mortality of more than one million individuals in the world.

Aims: This open level observational study has been designed to assess the therapeutic potentiality of favipiravir, an antiviral drug, originally developed for another coronavirus in patients with mild COVID-19.

Materials and Methods: A total of 45 COVID-19 patients positive for (SARS-CoV-2) confirmed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of nasal swab were enrolled in this study in Combined Military Hospital (CMH), Dhaka, Bangladesh. The patients were provided with standard of care (SoC) plus favipiravir for 10 days.

Results: No notable adverse event was recorded due to usage of favipiravir in these patients during the observation period. All patients became negative for SARS-CoV-2 and they were discharged from the hospital within a mean period of 12.4 days (the shortest period being 3 days and longest was 30 days).

Conclusion: Although this is an open level study, it seems that favipiravir is safe and effective for treatment of mild COVID-patients. However, a double-blind, controlled study with large sample size would be required to validate its clinical usage and registration.

Keywords: Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome 2 (SARS-CoV-2); Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19); Favipiravir

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Citation

Citation: Sheikh Mohammad Fazle Akbar., et al. “An Observational Study Regarding Usage of Favipiravir for COVID-19 Therapy". Acta Scientific Medical Sciences 4.11 (2020): 97-102.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Sheikh Mohammad Fazle Akbar., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.