WASHINGTON: A repurposed arthritis drug has shown positive improvement in a clinical test of patients hospitalized with Covid-19, consistent with a paper published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Drugs. This research claims that how arthritis drugs trials give positive responses in patients with severe covid.
Tofacitinib, taken orally and sold under the name Xeljanz among others, was tested during a trial of 289 patients hospitalized with severe Covid across 15 locations in Brazil.
Half received the drug -- a 10 mg pill twice each day -- and standard care like glucocorticoids that tamp an overactive immune reaction, while the opposite half received a placebo and standard care.
After 28 days, 18.1 percent of the group receiving the tofacitinib progressed to respiratory failure or death, compared to 29 percent within the placebo group.
This represented a statistically significant relative risk reduction of 63 percent.
Respiratory failure refers to a patient requiring noninvasive ventilation through a breathing device or being intubated and placed on a mechanical ventilator.
Deaths after 28 days occurred in 2.8 percent of patients within the tofacitinib group and in 5.5 percent of these within the placebo group.
Serious side effects occurred in 14.1 percent within the tofacitinib group and in 12 percent within the placebo group.
"We are encouraged by the initial findings of our randomized trial of tofacitinib in patients hospitalized with COVID-19 pneumonia," said Otavio Berwanger of Hospital Israelita Einstein, which coordinated the trial alongside Pfizer.
"These results provide new information which indicates that the utilization of tofacitinib when added to the plan of care, which incorporates glucocorticoids, may further reduce the danger of death or respiratory failure during this patient population."
Tofacitinib belongs to a category of medicine called Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitors.
It is approved within us to treat conditions including atrophic arthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, and colitis.