FDA Issues Emergency Use Authorization For Gilead’s Coronavirus Treatment Remdesivir

TOPLINE

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday issued an emergency use authorization for remdesivir, an antiviral drug that has shown some promising preliminary results in early clinical trials.

KEY FACTS

Cruciual quote

“There is limited information known about the safety and effectiveness of using remdesivir to treat people in the hospital with COVID-19. Remdesivir was shown in a clinical trial to shorten the time to recovery in some people. There are no medicines approved by the FDA as safe and effective to treat people in the hospital who have COVID-19,” the FDA fact sheet says.

Key background

The Trump Administration faced harsh scrutiny from the scientific community after it issued a similar emergency use authorization for antimalarial drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine at the end of March, which allows doctors to prescribe the drugs when a clinical trial isn’t available. At the time, there had been no clinical trial data released, which stands in contrast to remdesivir, and President Donald Trump continued to promote the drugs in his daily press briefings, though now he has largely stopped.

Further reading

Gilead’s Antiviral Remdesivir Had A Good Day – But It’s Still Not Clear How Effective It Is Against COVID-19 (Forbes)

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