Jahnavi Sarma
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Written By: Jahnavi Sarma
Updated : June 30, 2020 11:42 AM IST
Statin use was associated with 5.5 per cent mortality rate, compared to 6.8 per cent without statin use, representing a 19 per cent decrease.
With the COVID-19 pandemic raging on unabated and no vaccine or cure in sight yet, scientists are looking at existing drugs that may help in the treatment of patients infected with this virus. Now scientists say that commonly used cholesterol-lowering statin drugs may help reduce the death rate in hospitalised COVID-19 patients. Experts have till date experimented on many existing drugs including the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine. But many of these drugs have had unwanted and adverse effects while others have shown promise as potential cures for COVID-19.
Currently, there is no vaccine or specific anti-viral drug approved to prevent or treat severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection, which causes COVID-19. Because a vaccine or drugs for COVID-19 will likely not be available for months or even years, repurposing clinically approved therapies appears to be a more attractive option.
This new study from China's Wuhan University says that the use of cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins is associated with a lower death rate and a lesser incidence of mechanical ventilation in hospitalised COVID-19 patients. The findings, published in the journal Cell Metabolism, also show that mortality risk and other negative outcomes were not increased by combination therapy consisting of statins and blood pressure-lowering drugs called angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors and angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs). According to researchers, these results support the safety and potential benefits of statin therapy in hospitalised patients with COVID-19 and provide a rationale for prospective studies to determine whether statins confer protection against COVID-19-associated mortality.
Statins may serve such a purpose because these drugs slow the progression of lung injury in animals, improve immune cell responses, and strongly reduce inflammation, which is likely responsible for severe COVID-19 complications such as organ damage. Although statins generally have an excellent safety profile in humans, animal studies have shown that they increase the expression of angiotensin-converting enzyme II (ACE2) the receptor that SARS-CoV-2 binds to and uses to enter host cells.
On the other hand, animal studies have also shown that ACE2 protects organs such as the lungs against virus-induced injury. As a result, it has not been clear how clinical outcomes in patients with COVID-19 are affected by the use of statins, either alone or in combination with ACE inhibitors and ARBs, which are commonly prescribed with statins and also increase ACE2 expression in animals. To address this gap in knowledge, Li and his collaborators carried out a retrospective study of 13,981 corona patients admitted to 21 hospitals in Hubei Province, China. Among these patients, 1,219 used statins, primarily atorvastatin at an average dose of 20 mg per day. Among patients with hypertension, 319 used statins combined with ACE inhibitors or ARBs, and 603 used statins combined with other anti-hypertensive drugs.
Over a 28-day follow-up period, statin use was associated with a lower death rate and a lower incidence of mechanical ventilation. Statin use was associated with 5.5 per cent mortality rate, compared to 6.8 per cent without statin use, representing a 19 per cent decrease, said the study.
(With inputs from IANS)
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