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Secondary bacterial infection of the lung (pneumonia) was extremely common in patients with COVID-19, affecting almost half the patients who required support from mechanical ventilation. By applying machine learning to medical record data, scientists found that secondary bacterial pneumonia that does not resolve was a key driver of death in patients with COVID-19. It may even exceed death rates from the viral infection itself. The scientists also found evidence that COVID-19 does not cause a "cytokine storm," so often believed to cause death. "Our study highlights the importance of preventing, looking for and aggressively treating secondary bacterial pneumonia in critically...

Research has identified cytokines that can help predict which COVID-19 patients are at risk of serious illness and death. An overreaction of the immune system, in which excessive levels of proteins called cytokines produce damaging levels of inflammation, can lead to organ failure and death in COVID-19 patients. It isn't known, however, which cytokines drive the process. Being able to measure levels of these cytokines when patients are admitted to the hospital would allow those with the worst prognosis to be identified and their therapy personalized. Dr. Emanuela Sozio carried out a retrospective study of 415 patients (65.5% male) hospitalized...

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, clinicians have noted that certain patients are at especially high risk of developing severe illness or dying from coronavirus infection. Type 2 diabetes—a condition affecting more than 10 percent of the U.S. population— is one of the main risk factors for severe COVID-19 illness. New research from U-M uncovers why this might be and offers hope for a potential therapy. The culprit appears to be an enzyme called SETDB2. This same enzyme has been implicated in the non-healing, inflammatory wounds found in people with diabetes…. "We think we have a reason for why these patients are...

During this time of rampant COVID-19 infection, there are a lot of opinions and commentaries hitting the journals regarding treatment for patients. The problem is that the experimental studies that need to be done to determine effective treatments are currently underway and we will have to wait weeks or months for the results. In the intervening period, we are left with expert opinions about how to move forward. This is especially concerning for those with comorbid conditions that put them at greater risk of contracting COVID-19 or who may experience a more severe disease if they become infected. A recent...

Some 93% of 90 coronavirus serious patients treated in several Greek hospitals with a new drug developed by a team at Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center as part of the Phase II trial of the treatment were discharged in five days or fewer. The Phase II trial confirmed the results of Phase I, which was conducted in Israel last winter and saw 29 out of 30 patients in moderate to serious condition recover within days. “The main goal of this study was to verify that the drug is safe,” Prof. Nadir Arber said. “To this day we have not registered...

Israel’s “precision medicine” for COVID-19, which tackles the immune overreaction that causes deterioration from the disease, will start a second round of clinical trials in Greece next week. The testing comes with interest in coronavirus drugs sky-high, amid spiraling cases in several countries where widespread vaccine protection isn’t expected anytime soon, including India, where there are more than 300,000 new cases per day, and Nepal, where hospitals are struggling. The inhaled drug EXO-CD24 was given to 30 patients in moderate condition or worse, and all of them recovered, 29 of them within three to five days. In February Tel Aviv’s...

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), continues to spread worldwide. To date, over 177.13 million cases have been reported, and over 3.8 million have lost their lives. Finding effective treatments that can mitigate severe disease remains a crucial area of scientific research. Drug repurposing for COVID-19 helps scientists identify potential drugs to treat COVID-19 without going through the rigorous process of formulation, clinical trials, and gaining regulatory body approval. Many of the drugs used for COVID-19 today were initially developed for other pathogens. Early-stage trials from scientists at the University of Pennsylvania,...

NeuroRx Announces ZYESAMI™ (aviptadil, RLF-100) Met the Primary Endpoint of Its Phase 2b/3 Clinical Trial and Also Demonstrated a Meaningful Benefit in Survival from Critical COVID-19 RADNOR, Pa., March 29, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- NeuroRx, Inc. today reports 60-day results of the Phase 2b/3 trial of intravenously-administered ZYESAMI™ (aviptadil acetate) for the treatment of respiratory failure in critically-ill patients with COVID-19, which is being developed in collaboration with Relief Therapeutics Holding AG (SIX:RLF,OTCQB:RLFTF). Across all patients and sites, ZYESAMI™ met the primary endpoint for successful recovery from respiratory failure at days 28 (P = .014) and 60 (P = .013) and...

Study finds an extract of enhanced Spirulina reduces by 70% the release of an immune-system protein that causes dangerous cytokine storm in the lungs. =============================================================== Spirulina powder. Photo by FOODISM360 on Unsplash ======================================================== An extract of Spirulina blue-green algae may help Covid-19 patients avoid getting seriously ill, according to a study by Israeli and Icelandic scientists published in the journal Marine Biotechnology. “The potential health benefits of Spirulina are well documented,” the authors noted. “This blue-green algae contains C-phycocyanin (C-PC), a pigment-binding protein, which enhances antioxidation, anti-inflammation, and anti-tumor activities.” The scientists found that an extract of photosynthetically enhanced Spirulina...

Israeli scientists and researchers are racing to find a cure for COVID-19, as global consensus is forming among medical professionals that vaccination is not going to eliminate corona. When Israel launched its mass vaccination campaign, there were many who believed there would no longer be a need for medication, Prof. Eli Schwartz, founder of the Center for Travel Medicine and Tropical Disease at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer, told The Jerusalem Post. “Now we know that this was an illusion,” he said. “Even in Israel, not everyone is taking the vaccine. There is quite a big population of youngsters...

A new coronavirus treatment developed at Tel Aviv’s Ichilov Medical Center appears to have cured 29 of 30 moderately-ill and seriously-ill COVID-19 patients, the hospital said. The patients were released within 3 to 5 days of being treated.. This was only the first stage of trials and many months and thousands of patients will have to be treated before anything definitive can be said about the treatment. But the drug apparently works on the immune system to prevent a cytokine storm, which often leads to critical illness and death. Nadir Arber, the professor who invented the potential treatment, hailed the...

Severe cases of Covid-19 have been known to lead to a mysterious condition whereby the body's immune system goes haywire and starts attacking healthy cells, rather than just those that are infected. This prolonged state of self-sabotage is known as a 'cytokine storm' and can be fatal, but researchers have struggled to understand how it works and how to treat it. Now new research has looked at the progression of a coronavirus infection in mice and found the cytokine storm is a vicious cycle, which leads to the overproduction of two signalling proteins called tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-alpha and interferon...

Trump needs to have the DHS keep an eye on Lenzilumab (Lenz) Testing. Lenz was the only treatment that neutralized the Cytokine Storm Pre-Covid (since 2015) and now appears to cure Covid faster than any pharmaceutical out there even when just being used by itself. It was good to see that Tucker Carlson DID talk about Lenzilumab (Lenz) a couple weeks ago as possibly being the first FDA approved Covid pharmaceutical ( https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/potential-breakthrough-coronavirus-treatment/vi-BB19FOgW ). Otherwise news most likely passed you and everyone else by. Giving cover to the FDA and NIAID with the task of slow walking testing past the...

The immune system is usually seen as our ally in fighting disease, but in the case of coronavirus, it can sometimes turn into our foe. A phenomenon known as a cytokine storm has been implicated in many fatal cases of Covid-19, and several drugs are currently being tested to calm this storm and raise patients’ chances of survival. These drugs are known as anti-C5 drugs as they prevent a molecule named C5 from triggering the complement system to produce cytokines, which are known to cause inflammation in the body. Over-activation of cytokines (also known as a cytokine storm) has also...

New Drug Promises “Rapid Recovery From Respiratory Failure”“Overall, 81% of RLF-100™-treated patients survived beyond 60 days, compared to 17% of control patients.” Oct 13, 2020 GENEVA and RADNOR, Pa., Oct. 13, 2020 /PRNewswire/ – RELIEF THERAPEUTICS Holding AG and NeuroRx, Inc., today announced topline results from 45 patients assessed in an open-label prospective study where 21 patients admitted to an intensive care unit (ICU) with critical COVID-19 and respiratory failure were treated with RLF-100™(aviptadil) and compared to 24 control patients treated in the same setting. All patients had severe comorbidities that rendered them ineligible for the ongoing randomized controlled phase...

NeuroRx and Relief Therapeutics Announce Fast Track Designation Granted by the FDA to RLF-100 (Aviptadil) for the Treatment of Respiratory Distress in COVID-19 Fast Track Designation of RLF-100 for the treatment of Acute Lung Injury/Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome associated with COVID-19 underscores the urgent need for new treatment options for these patients. At FDA's request, NeuroRx is submitting an expanded access policy enabling physicians to request RLF-100 for patients who meet this criterion. June 24, 2020 01:30 AM Eastern Daylight Time RADNOR, Pa. & GENEVA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--NeuroRx, Inc. (OTC:RLFTF), in partnership with RELIEF THERAPEUTICS Holding AG (SIX:RLF) “Relief” today announced that...

FDA Lets NeuroRx, Relief Therapeutics Test RLF-100 in COVID-19 PatientsZURICH — The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has granted NeuroRx Inc Investigational New Drug (IND) permission to test RLF-100 (aviptadil) for inhaled use in patients with moderate and severe COVID-19 to prevent progression to respiratory failure, it and partner Relief Therapeutics Holdings said on Thursday. ... They said aviptadil is shown as the first COVID therapeutic to block replication of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in human lung cells and monocytes while also preventing synthesis of cytokines in the lung. ... has been granted FDA fast track designation, FDA emergency use IND...

Dexamethasone, a cheap and widely used steroid, has become the first drug shown to be able to save lives among COVID-19 patients in what scientists hailed as a “major breakthrough”. Results of trials announced on Tuesday showed dexamethasone, which is used to reduce inflammation in other diseases, reduced death rates by around a third among the most severely ill COVID-19 patients admitted to hospital. The results suggest the drug should immediately become standard care in patients with severe cases of the pandemic disease, said the researchers who led the trials. “This is a result that shows that if patients who...

A cheap and widely available drug can help save the lives of patients seriously ill with coronavirus. The low-dose steroid treatment dexamethasone is a major breakthrough in the fight against the deadly virus, UK experts say. The drug is part of the world's biggest trial testing existing treatments to see if they also work for coronavirus. It cut the risk of death by a third for patients on ventilators. For those on oxygen, it cut deaths by a fifth. Had the drug had been used to treat patients in the UK from the start of the pandemic, up to 5,000...

Purpose Infection with COVID-19 potentially can result in severe outcomes and death from “cytokine storm syndrome”, resulting in novel coronavirus pneumonia (NCP) with severe dyspnea, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), fulminant myocarditis and multiorgan dysfunction with or without disseminated intravascular coagulation. No published treatment to date has been shown to adequately control the inflammation and respiratory symptoms associated with COVID-19, apart from oxygen therapy and assisted ventilation. We evaluated the effects of using high dose oral and/or IV glutathione in the treatment of 2 patients with dyspnea secondary to COVID-19 pneumonia. Methods Two patients living in New York City (NYC)...