Lymphoma drug outperforms Remdesivir against the COVID-19 virus

A novel computational drug screening strategy combined with lab experiments suggest that pralatrexate drug is a promising candidate for COVID-19 patients.

A novel computational drug screening strategy combined with lab experiments suggest that pralatrexate drug is a promising candidate for COVID-19 patients.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, experts have looked at ways to control the virus and eliminate. There have been lots of hits and misses. Hopes were raised and dashed. But scientists did not give up hope for a cure. Now vaccines have been developed and mass vaccinations have already started in some countries. In India, vaccine rollout is planned for January. But, at the same time, experts are tirelessly looking for medications that can help in the fight against the virus. Many old drugs have been identified and repurposed for this.

Now, a chemotherapy medication originally developed to treat lymphoma has outperformed the popular remdesivir drug against SARS-CoV-2 in lab settings and could potentially be repurposed to treat COVID-19, say researchers FROM the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology in Shenzhen, China. A novel computational drug screening strategy combined with lab experiments suggest that pralatrexate drug is a promising candidate for COVID-19 patients. The novel screening approach identified four promising drugs, which were then tested against SARS-CoV-2 in lab experiments. Two of the drugs, pralatrexate and azithromycin, successfully inhibited replication of the virus.

Chemo drug for terminal cancer patients inhibits viral replication

Further lab experiments showed that pralatrexate more strongly inhibited viral replication than did remdesivir, a drug that is currently used to treat some COVID-19 patients. Researchers screened 1,906 existing drugs for their potential ability to inhibit replication of SARS-CoV-2 by targeting a viral protein called RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRP). The findings, published in open-access journal PLOS Computational Biology, suggest that pralatrexate could potentially be repurposed to treat COVID-19.

Significant side-effects a setback

However, this chemotherapy drug can prompt significant side effects and is used for people with terminal lymphoma, so immediate use for COVID-19 patients is not guaranteed. Still, the findings support the use of the new screening strategy to identify drugs that could be repurposed.

The importance of repurposing old drugs to treat COVID-19

With the COVID-19 pandemic causing illness and death worldwide, better treatments are urgently needed. One shortcut could be to repurpose existing drugs that were originally developed to treat other conditions. Researchers have demonstrated the value of their novel hybrid approach that combines deep-learning technologies with more traditional simulations of molecular dynamics. They are now developing additional computational methods for generating novel molecular structures that could be developed into new drugs to treat COVID-19.

(With inputs from IANS)