The curious case of Remdesivir — the coronavirus ‘miracle drug’ may be overhyped, suggests Lancet study

• A new study in the US shows positive signs that Gilead’s Remdesivir antiviral drug could be a promising treatment for the coronavirus.
• A contradictory Lancet study indicates Remdesivir is yet to prove its benefits in a statistically significant way.
• Lancet’s study concludes that a larger benefit may exist — or Remdesivir might actually do harm. Either way, more data is needed.

Biotechnology giant Gilead, claims that the antiviral drug Remdesivir works as a plausible treatment for COVID-19. However, a contradictory Lancet study warns that there are no clinical benefits to patients who have tested positive for the coronavirus.


Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), told reporters that the Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial has cut down on recovery time for patients.

Lancet has not analysed NIAID’s results but the results from a study conducted in China, which was testing Remdesivir. According to the medical journal, the antiviral drug shows hope but the results are far from being conclusive.

While trials should continue, a paper by John David Norrie from the University of Edinburgh warns that, in the past, people have pinned their hopes on drugs like hydroxychloroquine and lopinavir-ritonavir only to be disappointed — even when randomised trials showed promise in the early days.

Coronavirus recovery with Remdesivir
In a lot of these early studies, recovery doesn’t necessarily mean being coronavirus-free.

According to Fauci, recovery could mean many things. It could mean being hospitalized without ventilator support. It could also mean being discharged but needing oxygen support at home. At the same time, it doesn’t rule out an ideal scenario of being discharged without limitation on activities.

The study that Lancet analysed also had similar constraints. On a scale to one to six, where one is being discharged and six is death, a patient’s results were considered to be successful if they only showed a decline of two points.

“The study has not shown a statistically significant finding that confirms a Remdesivir treatment benefit of at least the minimally clinically important difference, nor has it ruled such a benefit out,” said the report.

In cases where COVID-19 is caught early like within ten days of symptoms, were cured much faster than the others. However, these results are not statistically significant. Even Fauci pointed out that the difference in deaths — 8% in the Remdesivir group compared with 11% in the placebo — had not yet reached statistical significance.

Lancet believes the results from Remdesivir are inconclusive
Remdesivir may have the potential for treating coronavirus patients effectively, but as of now, it’s too soon to tell because most of the data that’s available is incomplete.

The study in China, for instance, while being a well conducted double-bind, placebo-controlled, multicentre, and randomised trial — had to be terminated early, due to low enrollment.

“The temptation to lower the threshold of convincing evidence must be resisted because adopting ineffective and potentially unsafe interventions risks only harm without worthwhile benefit while making it even harder to undertake trials to find truly effective and safe interventions,” said Lancet’s report.

Investigators concluded that additional studies were needed to prove clinical benefit.“A larger benefit might exist, or Remdesivir might actually do harm. It is unknown—more data are needed,” it said.

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