Kochi: Doctors in Kerala's Ernakulam Medical College Hospital have started using anti-HIV drug combination Lopinavir and Ritonavir for the treatment of a COVID-19 patient.
The pill has been touted as a potential medicine for the novel coronavirus, which causes COVID-19, even though a latest study has contradicted this claim.
The medicine was tested on COVID-19 patients in other parts of the world including Wuhan, the epicentre of the novel coronavirus outbreak. In India, the drug was reportedly used in Rajasthan and Odisha.
A UK citizen was admitted to the isolation ward at the Medical College Hospital after he was offloaded from a Dubai-bound flight on Sunday.
The doctors, led by medical college principal Dr Thomas Mathew, decided to revise the treatment protocol and administer the pill from Wednesday night after the patient was diagnosed with pneumonia.
The other three COVID-19 patients admitted to the hospital, including a toddler, are being given only supportive medicines as their condition is stable, Mathew told Onmanorama.
“Lopinavir-Ritonavir combo is being administered on the UK citizen with his consent. We also got approval from the State Medical Board and the Indian Council of Medical Research,” he said.
Dr Mathew said it was too early to comment on the effectiveness of the drug. The spouse of the patient, also kept at the isolation ward, has tested negative for the coronavirus.
Fathahuddin, Jacob Jacob, Ganesh Mohan and Geetha Nair are the other doctors in the team.
On Tuesday, the Union Health Ministry recommended such a course on a case-to-case basis.
In its revised guidelines on the 'Clinical Management of COVID - 19' issued on Tuesday, the Health Ministry recommended Lopinavir-Ritonavir for high-risk groups patients aged above 60, suffering from diabetes mellitus, renal failure, chronic lung disease and are immuno-compromised.
Not effective: study
The pill has not been effective for COVID-19 treatment, according to a study released on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
It said that 99 COVID-19 patients who were given AbbVie Inc's Kaletra (a combination of lopinavir and ritonavir) fared no better than the 100 who received standard care. “People who received the combination showed small gains in the time to clinical improvement and mortality at 28 days, but the differences were not statistically significant,” the report stated.
People on the drugs showed clinical improvement after a median of 15 days compared to 16 days with standard care, a difference the researchers characterized as "significant, albeit modest."
There is no current evidence from randomised controlled trial to recommend any specific treatment for suspected or confirmed patients with COVID-19.
No specific anti-virals are recommended for treatment of those suffering from respiratory ailment due to lack of adequate evidence from medical literature.
(With inputs from Reuters)
