Both Chloroquine and Lopinavir/Ritonavir Are Ineffective for COVID-19 Treatment and Combined Worsen the Pathology: A Single-Center Experience with Severely Ill Patients.
Biomed Res Int
; 2021: 8821318, 2021.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1083860
ABSTRACT
The off-label use of antiviral and antimalarial drugs has been considered by many researchers as a fast and relatively safe alternative to provide therapeutic options to treat COVID-19, but the assessment of such drug-specific effectiveness in this regard is far from complete. Especially, the current body of knowledge about COVID-19 therapeutics needs more data regarding drug effectiveness and safety in the severely ill patients with comorbidities. In the present article, we retrospectively analyze data from 61 patients that received treatment with chloroquine, lopinavir/ritonavir, both drugs administered together, or a standard treatment with no antiviral drugs, and the study was carried in severely ill patients. We found that either drug is ineffective at treating COVID-19, as they are not able to reduce hospitalization length, mortality, C-reactive protein (CRP), lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), d-Dimer, or ferritin, or to enhance gasometric parameters, lymphocytes, total leukocytes, and neutrophil levels, whereas both drugs administered together decrease circulating lymphocytes, increase LDH and ferritin levels, and more importantly, enhance mortality. In this way, our results show that both drugs are ineffective and even potentially harmful alternatives against SARS-CoV-2.
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Chloroquine
/
Ritonavir
/
Lopinavir
/
COVID-19 Drug Treatment
Type of study:
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
Limits:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Aged
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
/
Middle aged
/
Young adult
Language:
English
Journal:
Biomed Res Int
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
2021
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