Scientists in Australia claim that they have found an anti-parasitic drug that can kill SARS-CoV-2—the virus that causes coronavirus disease (COVID-19)—within 48 hours.
In a research published on Antiviral Research journal, scientists from Monash University said that a single dose of FDA-approved drug Ivermectin stops the virus from growing in cell culture, thus destroying its genetic materials in just two days.
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“We found that even a single dose could essentially remove all viral RNA by 48 hours and that even at 24 hours, there was a really significant reduction in it,” said lead researcher Dr Kylie Wagstaff.
He said that the study was conducted in a lab and that need more research is needed to determine if they are safe to be tested on people. However, their team believes the drug is likely to stop the virus.
“Ivermectin is very widely used and seen as a safe drug. We need to figure out now whether the dosage you can use it at in humans will be effective – that’s the next step,” he added.
Dr Wagstaff and Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute’s Professor David Jans have begun studying Ivermectin since the start of the pandemic, as the latter has been researching the drug for over a decade on different viruses.
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