Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) is planning to revise its treatment guidelines for Covid-19 and may drop hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) from the protocol due to increasing doubt over its effectiveness, the Economic Times has reported https://health.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/diagnostics/hiv-drug-may-replace-hydroxychloroquine-in-covid-defence/75819639.
Revised treatment protocol is likely to include HIV combination drugs, and FDA-approved Ivermectin along with supplements of zinc and Vitamin C to improve immunity and possibly reduce viral replication.
It now plans to conduct a trial on HCQ’s effectiveness.
A new HIV drug injected every two months effectively reduces the rate of infection, and provides longer and stronger protection than taking pills, a global trial published Monday revealed.
The four-year trial, conducted by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the U.S. and six other countries, injected a drug called cabotegravir every two months into 4,570 men and transgender women who have sex with men and are at high risk of contracting HIV.
Among 50 people who became infected with HIV during the trial, 12 received the injected drug, and 38 got daily oral pills with different drugs, tenofovir and emtricitabine — the only Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs to prevent HIV.
The finding — in which a third fewer people became infected on cabotegravir compared with the other drugs — “marks the first time a large-scale clinical trial has shown a systemic, long-acting form of HIV prevention to be highly effective,” the study report said.
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