The first corona drug approved: Paxlovid
Paxlovid: Does the corona pill cause renewed infectivity?
Paxlovid is the first approved corona drug that can be taken in pill form. What’s behind the pill?
The corona drug Paxlovid has also been approved in the European Union for the treatment of Covid-19 since January. The drug from the US manufacturer Pfizer could prevent patients from developing a serious illness after a corona infection, the Ema said at the time.
Now US President Joe Biden has tested positive for the corona virus again shortly after his recovery after taking Paxlovid. Is there a connection between reinfection and the drug?
What is Paxlovid?
Paxlovid is a corona drug in tablet form. It combines the new active ingredient nirmatrelvir with the drug ritonavir, which is already being used to treat HIV patients. Patients take two tablets of nirmatrelvir and one tablet of ritonavir twice a day for five days.
The drug is manufactured by Biontech partner Pfizer in Germany, primarily in Freiburg.
Who gets Paxlovid?
Paxlovid is used in high-risk patients with mild to moderate symptoms of the disease and, according to Pfizer, reduces the risk of hospitalization or death by almost 90 percent.
The drug reduces the ability of the coronavirus to multiply in the body’s cells and thus slows down the further development of the disease Covid-19 caused by the virus.
What side effects could Paxlovid cause?
As the medical journal reports, there are also possible side effects with the new corona drug, such as:
impairment of the sense of taste
Diarrhea
high blood pressure
Muscle aches
Does Paxlovid cause reinfection?
According to his doctor O’Connor, US President Joe Biden currently has no symptoms. The doctor explained that such a “relapse” had already been observed in rare cases in patients treated with the Covid drug Paxlovid. Developments are being monitored closely, but the drug is currently not being administered again.
Cases like that of Joe Biden have been observed in the United States for some time, so the American health authority CDC is already warning of them. The epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding also warned in May not to underestimate the “rebound effect” after the administration of Paxlovid:
The “Ärzteblatt” also recently reported that a so-called relapse phenomenon can occur if there is a mild course of Covid 19 and treatment with Paxlovid has taken place.
A case study reports on a woman with previous illnesses who experienced something similar to what the US President is doing now. The authors of the study come to the conclusion that the drug-based reduction in viral load may have suppressed or delayed an adequate immune response to permanently eliminate the virus.
In this form of reinfection, mainly mild courses have been observed so far, which trigger only a few symptoms. According to the CDC, there is nothing to indicate that further treatment will be necessary.
