Common Depression Drug Fluvoxamine Reduces COVID-19 Hospitalizations

Treating COVID-19 with the drug fluvoxamine, often used for depression, reduces the risk of prolonged hospitalizations, a study published in The Lancet reveals.

Its use in outpatients with early diagnoses – and considered high risk – also reduces the need to keep them under long observation periods in “emergency units”, Highlight the authors of a randomized trial developed by the TOGETHER collective.

Fluvoxamine, they explain, is one of the oldest drugs in the class of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), and is prescribed to treat major depression in many countries and for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).

The TOGETHER trials started in June 2020 with the aim of testing the efficacy of eight treatments, while fluvoxamine began to be administered in January 2021 in a group of positive, symptomatic, unvaccinated and high-grade COVID-19 Brazilian adults. risk.

741 subjects were treated with 100 milligrams of the drug twice daily for ten days and 756 received doses of placebo.

After 28 days of observation, the researchers found that only 10.6% of the medicated patients had to stay for more than six hours in a hospital. “Emergency unit”Or hospitalized, compared to 15.7% of those who received the placebo.

The results, they underline, show that the absolute reduction in the risk of hospitalizations or long-term care was 5%, while the relative reduction was 32%.

Although the issue of mortality was not the main object of study, they specify, a secondary analysis of patients who received at least 80% of the doses of fluvoxamine recorded a single death, compared to 12 in the placebo group.

“Vaccine development and campaigns have been effective and important in reducing the number of new symptomatic cases, hospitalizations, and deaths from COVID-19. However, COVID still poses risks for individuals in countries with few resources and limited access to vaccines.“Said in a statement Edward Mills, from McMaster University (Canada) and co-principal investigator of the study.

Therefore, it highlights the importance of identifying therapies “cheap, widely available and effective“For COVID, such as fluvoxamine, which in addition to its value as a” reusable “drug was selected for this trial for its”anti-inflammatory properties”.

This medicine can reduce the production of inflammatory molecules, called “cytokines“, Which can”develop from the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus infection″ Observes Angela Reiersen, from the University of Washington Saint Louis (USA) and co-author of the text.