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A science team led by UCSF may have found another breakthrough drug treatment to fight COVID-19, as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle. Studies have shown that small concentrations of Aplidin, a drug created using an extraction from a sea creature called Aplidium albicans, killed the virus both in infected human lung cells and in cells. analogues of monkeys.
The study, which was published in the journal Science, shows that the “sea spray” found off the coast of Ibiza could be “almost 30 times more powerful than Remdesivir,” reported the Chronicle. Although it has not yet been approved to treat patients with COVID-19, if it proves effective, this treatment would be a welcome addition to the small amount of antiviral drugs available to treat the disease.
“We need new weapons in the arsenal,” said Nevan Krogan, a UCSF molecular biologist who led the science team with Adolfo García-Sastre, a virus expert at Icahn School of Medicine in Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, told the San Francisco Chronicle. “This is by far the best thing we’ve seen.”
The drug, also known as plitidepsin, is not commercially available in much of the world, but has already been approved in Australia to treat a type of blood cancer called multiple myeloma. It is owned by Pharma Mar, a Spanish company founded by a scuba diving scientist.
In a clinical trial in Spain, Pharma Mar reported that 27 patients receiving aplidine saw reduced time in hospital recovering from COVID-19, with 81% of patients returning home within 15 days. The typical rate of return is 47%.
Aplidine has also been tested with success in mice, with the virus effectively clearing the body after treatment. Unlike Remdesivir, rather than attacking the virus, the drug could prevent a specific protein inside human cells from replicating the virus.
Further trials are planned in the United States and Spain, Pascal Besman, the company’s chief operating officer, told The Chronicle.
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