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tv   Shift  Deutsche Welle  February 16, 2021 3:45pm-4:01pm CET

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treatment to prevent city a symptoms from the illness or death a leading expert on covert therapeutics all of whom could told you we could see a breakthrough soon with so many medicines of various stages of development some of them already tried tests with patients on a look are true stage and we see some good interim results which lead those to think that we can see improvements within the next year and he says the virus could well stick around after the pandemic so there may always be people who need treatment here's a look at some of the most promising therapies being worked on. you may know the name hydroxy chloroquine it was often uttered by former u.s. president donald trump who had hoped it could help win the fight against copa 19. let's see if it works it might and it might not i happen to feel good about it but who knows but science disagreed with that feeling after studies showed that the
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decades old anti-malarial drug was ineffective against the new virus u.s. authorities revoked its emergency use authorization. now a year into the pandemic researchers are getting a clearer picture of what works and what doesn't back to trump and this time a success story. when the president himself ended up in the hospital with the pope at 19 he was given a drug cocktail made by the company regenerate. trump quickly recovered and became a walking advertisement for the treatment. the region cove to treatment uses artificial antibodies that bind to a virus cells and prevent them from replicating. so far studies have shown promising results now the german government has ordered 200000 doses of antibody treatments for general honore and competitor lilly at a price of around $2000.00 per dose. another promising prospect interferon beta
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it's a protein produced by the body when it gets an infection and early findings suggest that when it's inhaled by an infected person it could keep 80 percent of hospitalized patients off the ventilator. and this rare c. animal off the coast of spain has become an unlikely source of hope a substance extracted from it is being used to create a drug called. or applet in which can slow the spread of the corona virus and human body. early studies show it to be 30 times more effective than the ones hyped are and as a beer. one problem all of these treatments are expensive and will likely only be available in the world's wealthier countries demand for widely available drugs like ivermectin has surged in latin america and subsaharan africa ivermectin is an inexpensive anti parasite drug but scientists warn its effectiveness is still in doubt some doctors in developing nations are instead putting their hopes in
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affordable steroids treatments like decks and methods but for the world health organization the focus is still clear vaccinate enough of the world's population over the next year to put the pandemic behind us. for more uncovered 19 back scenes versus treatments here's our science correspondent derek williams with another of alfio questions. why we need facts seems is the only solution. most of the few medications being used to try to treat covert night like those we just saw are water known as repurposed medicines that means they were originally planned for something else rendez a beer for example was originally developed as a possible therapy for ebola when the pandemic hit researchers started testing these existing medications 1st because they'd already fulfilled
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a crucial criteria they've proven safe to take around $400.00 drugs for treating covert 19 are currently in human trials many of them also repurposed they can be split into 3 broad categories 1st are medications like monoclonal antibodies which are aimed at keeping moderate cases of covert 19 from getting worse if they're given to patients at the right time. by blocking the virus that can sometimes stop the body's immune system from going into this dangerous tailspin that can ravage the lungs and and the heart and other organs if that happens anyway doctors start employing the 2nd type of drugs which are anti inflammatory like that some episode they come down that hyper immune response that can cause more damage than the infection itself the 3rd group of medications which
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are at the top of doctors' wish lists are antiviral drugs they attack viruses directly in a variety of ways rather than just trying to block them or treat their consequences but for a number of biological reasons including the facts that they replicate in our own cells and that they change constantly viruses present a difficult target for drug developers developing new antivirals is a long painstaking and expensive process so to answer your question many of us are still looking at vaccines as the only solution because we still simply don't have the kinds of tailored knockout therapies that we need to keep people from dying but that will hopefully change soon. going is found as
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a coordinator of the anti microbial stewardship program at the breast medicine let's start with 3 puppets drugs because there was a lot of hope placed in those that a year on doctors still only have a handful of options none of which have proven convincing why is that. that's right over 1000 still very difficult to treat and that's because corona viruses are more complex than other viruses their genomes are larger than most are named viruses and they have a way of double checking viral replication there's been a lot of mixed results with these repurposed drugs and i think that's because disease presentation matters so much at what stage they're at when they come in and really impact their peace we try to use balancing that immunosuppression and that fighting inflammation and we really have to be cautious about that so that virus doesn't increase replication if we start it too early is that the same reason for antivirals why it's so difficult to tailor those treatments to this disease with
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anti-virals we really want to start those earlier and most patients don't come in to seek care of the east in the hospital until 7 or 10 days of illness now with testing being more available we are seeing them earlier we just don't have good drugs yet that work on the virus the antibodies are really are our best option when we find out if i early why is it that when when vaccines were here in just 10 months. yeah the development process for anti-virals and is very difficult it often takes 10 years for really any drug to be developed and we're trying to do that and 10 months with vaccines there were multiple platforms that could be used to. insert target for 19 to develop antibodies with drug development you really need to have
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a target for that treatment or for that virus you know when they come in and it's much more difficult and complex to coordinate these clinical trials and and human volunteers where with vaccines there were is thousands of people lining up to try to be protected and co the 19 was so prevalent in the community it was easier to measure that response and nobody's in protection from it and we just don't have the anti-viral sitting around that were super effective rhonda severe was mentioned as a little bit of activity. even with other viruses we don't have a lot of good anti-virals like influenza for example there's only a few drugs that work on it we have to target it in the cells of the body and it's more difficult to belt drugs for that than it is for say antibiotics about it so you can grow in a lab on their own and get
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a relatively good shock of whether it's going to work in a patient viruses have to be developed in cells in the lab even in animal models it doesn't always predict whether it'll work in a human because of the differences in salt. disease prevention of course is one of the main goals but that doesn't help someone who contracts the virus today help how much longer will patients have to wait do you think one expert we heard from earlier reckons within the next. you know i could say maybe within 6 months i'd say more likely it'll be years that we're going to wait for a very effective treatment i think you know and a lot of our resources were put into vaccine development try to prevent it the next phase should be. in drug development as i said it's very difficult to target that mechanism up roughly cation for viruses and especially coronavirus what
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is the main focus when it comes to producing medicines against. there are a couple different strategies one of them is to deliver the drugs earlier at the site of infection. that's severe for example hasn't it and held formulation that is being studied there's another oral anti-viral monye of cures career that is being studied that's an oral option that could be given earlier in the community in an attempt to terminate these spiral replication pattern inside the body and in a different way so that that proofreading ends i'm with in 19 doesn't recognize that there's a change and that the our name then falls apart trying to replicate. from nebraska medicine thank you very much for being on the show today pleasure thank you. finally most libraries remain closed which is a pain for kids readers and scholars they found
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a work around in budapest the biggest libraries set up a swap point it's proving popular with patrons making a reservation online and receiving the folks at the library gates all without entering the building the folks have to be quarantined for 72 hours after a time. thanks for watching stay safe and see you again soon.
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take. frankfurt in on the rise and. fall some ways if it's. morning it's for me. and mines make my bed good last team in the meat house never close until the clock by scoring the last minute goal. 30 minutes w.
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. how does a virus spread. why do we panic and when we'll all miss them. just 3 of the topics covered and we couldn't read your blog. if you would like and new information on the coronavirus or any other science topic you should really check out our podcast you can get it wherever you get your podcast you can also find us at d.f.w. dot com look for it slash science. d.t. you know that 77 percent a lot because our young up and thinks of hot. cuts me and me and you. and you know what it's time no voices want part. of the 77 percent we talk about the easy stuff propped up this is where it comes.
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to 77 percent this weekend on d w. why are people forced to hide in trucks. there are many reasons for such. there are many cancers. and there are many stories. to. make up your own mind. job made for mines.
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this is the end of the news life problem but i learned that hungry takes delivery of its 1st shipments of the chinese sign a farm vaccine becoming the 1st a new country to receive the drug as it claims the price of being a used vaccine rollout is costing lives also on the program on song suchi faces new charges this defiant protesters continues that calls for her release mass demonstrations fill the streets for the 15th day the military repeats its promise of elections in a year but fears of a violent crackdown are bright. eyed.

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