According to British specialists, this is very good news. An anti-inflammatory drug tocilizumab reduces the risk of death in patients hospitalized with severe Covid-19, according to the results of the Recovery clinical trial, which tests a range of drugs.
What kind of drug is tocilizumab?
“Tocilizumab is in a class of drugs called biologics. Tocilizumab is a treatment for adults with moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA), giant cell arteritis, and polyarticular and systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis. You must have tried and failed another medication for RA before starting tocilizumab”. hopkinsarthritis
Arthritis drug tocilizumab reduces the risk of death in critically ill covid-19 patients, according to the results of the RECOVERY trial, which has been testing a range of potential treatments for the disease since March of the last year.
The study found that 29% (596) of patients with covid-19 who received tocilizumab died within 28 days, compared to 33% (694) of those who did not receive the drug.
Roche’s arthritis drug tocilizumab found to reduce risk of death among patients with severe covid-19:
Treatment with tocilizumab - sold under the brand name Actemra by the Swiss company Roche - also shortened recovery time and reduced the need for mechanical ventilation.
An additional life saved for patients treated
The trial included 2022 covid-19 patients randomly assigned to receive tocilizumab in addition to their standard care and 2094 patients assigned to standard care only, which for 82% of all patients in the study included treatment with a steroid (dexamethasone).
Additional treatment of Covid:
Last year, dexamethasone became the first drug to reduce death rates in patients with covid-19.
The most recent results indicate that tocilizumab provides additional benefits when used with steroids, such as dexamethasone.
“Used in combination, the impact is substantial,” said Martin Landray of the University of Oxford, one of the trial's lead investigators.
"After dexamethasone (steroids), this is the most significant breakthrough in the treatment of covid," Athimalaipet Ramanan of the University of Bristol said in a statement.
Recovery trial continues
According to the website of the Recovery clinical trial, more than 36,000 participants have so far participated in this large study of several potentially effective drugs against the coronavirus.
Several molecules are being tested in this context, such as aspirin, colchicine and the Regeneron antibody cocktail (a combination of monoclonal antibodies directed against the coronavirus).