Study of available antiviral treatments for COVID-19 during pregnancy

ABSTRACT

Since the end of the year 2019, mankind has been confronting with the COVID-19 pandemic. Complex measures have been taken to solve this problem and the aim of this study is to summarise the results of research on the most used antiviral treatments for COVID-19 diagnosed in pregnant women. The specialty literature review was conducted by searching the PubMed (National Library of Medicine, Washington, DC) and Embase (Elsevier) databases. In the initial search in databases we used a combination of the following keywords “COVID-19”, “SARS-CoV-2”, “pregnancy” and “therapy”. Clinical trials were identified using the search term ”COVID-19” and the generic names of the drugs on ClinicalTrials.gov and International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) of WHO. Corresponding to the objectives of our research, we found articles and studies about antiviral drugs which act as protease inhibitors (lopinavir/ritonavir, darunavir/cobicistat), RNA polymerase inhibitors (remdesivir, favipiravir, ribavirin), umifenovir, antimalarial drugs (chloroquine, hydroxyclhoroquine) and others. Summarising what is currently known about the antiviral treatment of COVID-19 during pregnancy, we can conclude that, at this time, no antiviral drug is undoubtedly effective in the fight against SARS-CoV-2;the experience gained so far, leads to the idea that treatment schemes must combine several methods and drugs to be successful;a national or even international register should be set up to report situations where a medicine has been administered to a pregnant woman to monitor for side effects;pregnant women should also be included in studies, under rigorous conditions and after a clear demonstration of the effectiveness of medicines. © 2020, Romanian Society for Pharmaceutical Sciences. All rights reserved.