Dubai, United Arab Emirates (CNN) — In an earlier phase of the pandemic, there was hope that a popular heartburn drug wouldAn inexpensive, over-the-counter drug may treat COVID-19, but a recently published study shows mixed results.
During the clinical trial, the high-dose famotidine group that included mild to moderate COVID-19 patients improved faster than the placebo group.
But this experiment, believed to be the first of its kind, involved only a small number of participants. It was noted that the symptoms that affected the 55 participants in the study decreased in the group that received famotidine, the active substance in Pepcid, by 50% within 8.2 days, while these symptoms decreased in the other group that received the placebo treatment within 11.4 days.
Participants in the clinical trial received an 80-mg dose of famotidine three times a day for 14 days.
This dose is six times the highest recommended dose of famotidine, the active ingredient in Pepcid.
For his part, the editor-in-chief of the “Gut” journal, which published the study Thursday, said that the improvement in patients who took famotidine was “modest but significant.”
Dr. Imad Al-Omar, Professor of Medicine at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, indicated that after two weeks, symptoms persisted in people who were treated with a placebo, and they were twice as high as those who took famotidine.
“It’s impressive,” Al-Omar told CNN commenting.
Interest in famotidine began in China
Interest in famotidine for the treatment of COVID-19 is due to China, according to Dr. Kevin Tracy, co-author of the study.
In April 2020, Tracy told CNN that doctors there had noticed that some low-income people who had contracted the coronavirus lived longer than their rich counterparts who also had heartburn.
When they looked at it, they noticed that many of the lower-income patients were taking famotidine, while the wealthier patients tended to take the more expensive ones for heartburn.
“Poor farmers seem to be doing just fine with famotidine,” said Tracy, president of the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research at Northwell Health in New York.
There was great hope, especially in New York, where the virus was widespread at the time, especially since famotidine is inexpensive and has a long record as a safe drug.
A few months later, Tracy and his team in Northwell and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York reported that 10 people recovering from COVID-19 at home in the United States and Sweden saw “rapid improvement” in symptoms after a day or two of taking famotidine.
The team then tried to test the drug on hospitalized patients, but it ran into a problem with the availability of other treatment options for the declining number of “Covid-19” patients in New York. The study failed.
Famotidine appeared again when it was given to former US President Donald Trump when he was hospitalized with Covid-19 in December 2020.
But a few months later, a study by researchers at two drug companies found that famotidine was not helping people in hospital care.
The American Infectious Diseases Association recommends that famotidine not be used to treat patients with Covid-19 in hospitals, and no recommendations have been made for or against its use to treat people whose illness does not require admission to hospital.
In April 2020, the National Institutes of Health announced a public-private partnership to accelerate the study of potential drugs to treat COVID-19, including “re-use” drugs that are used to treat other conditions.
The next steps are not clear
Now, the study of famotidine for the treatment of COVID-19 is at a crossroads.
A team of researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory is studying how best to envision a larger clinical trial that would seriously test the efficacy of famotidine.
Tracy pointed out that the question, “Can we take a safe drug without a doctor’s recommendation, that can be manufactured and given to countries that do not have anything to treat Covid-19?” The question is considered “important to global health”.
However, not everyone agrees with him.
For their part, Drs. William Schaffner and Carlos Del Rio, experts in infectious diseases, said there was no reason to spend money on a large clinical trial to test the effectiveness of famotidine, especially since the United States has antiviral drugs and monoclonal antibodies. It is used to treat the early stage of COVID-19.
They added that if a person with COVID-19 wanted to try famotidine, they would likely not do any harm.
However, another infectious disease expert sees more hope for famotidine.
Dr. Paul Offit pointed to the results of the new study that examined indicators of inflammation in the blood of 35 participants, that people who took famotidine recovered from inflammation more quickly, compared to those who took a placebo.
The National Institutes of Health recommends tocilizumab, an anti-arthritis drug, to treat hospitalized COVID-19 patients.
He added that famotidine would have a much less tragic effect than tocilizumab, but would also have fewer side effects.
Offit encouraged more research into famotidine for the treatment of COVID-19.