Researchers are identifying a possible new treatment for COVID-19
Scientists during a recent study identified a possible new treatment that prevents replication of the COVID-19-causing virus SARS-CoV-2.
To multiply, all viruses, including coronaviruses, infect cells and reprogram them to produce new viruses. The study “Targeting the pentose phosphate pathway for SARS-CoV-2 therapy” has been published in the scientific journal Metabolite.
The study revealed that SARS-CoV-2-infected cells can produce new coronaviruses only when their metabolic pentose phosphate pathway is activated.
When the drug was used, benfoxytiamine, an inhibitor of this pathway, replication of SARS-CoV-2 was suppressed and the infected cells did not produce coronaviruses.
A study by the University of Kent’s School of Life Sciences and the Institute of Medical Virology at the Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main found that the drug also increased the antiviral activity of “2-deoxy-D-glucose”; a drug that alters the metabolism of the host cell to reduce the growth of the virus.
This indicates that inhibitors of the pentose phosphate pathway, such as benfoxytiamine, are a potential new treatment option for COVID-19, both alone and in combination with other therapies.
In addition, the antiviral mechanism of benfoxythiamine differs from that of other COVID-19 drugs, such as remdesivir and molnupiravir. Therefore, viruses resistant to them may be sensitive to benfoxytiamine.
Professor Martin Michaelis, University of Kent, said: “This is a breakthrough in COVID-19 treatment research. Because the development of resistance is a major problem in the treatment of viral diseases, the use of therapies using different targets is very important and provides additional hope for development. The most effective treatments for COVID-19.”
“Targeting viral-induced changes in host cell metabolism is an attractive way to disrupt the viral replication process in particular,” the professor added. Jindrich Cinatl From Goethe University in Frankfurt
Source: ANI