A wide spectrum of symptoms known as long COVID or post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 (PASC) continue for months after a person has recovered from the initial severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. Headaches, fever, extreme exhaustion, post-exercise malaise, dyspnea, loss of taste or smell, and more severe symptoms that involve organs including cardiovascular complications, neurological and cognitive impairments, renal and gastrointestinal issues are only a few of the symptoms.
According to estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), populations of racial or ethnic minorities are disproportionately affected by lengthy COVID. Furthermore, after recovering from the SARS-CoV-2 infection, at least 15% of individuals in the U.S. experience prolonged symptoms similar to COVID. Hence, it is crucial to comprehend the factors influencing the prevalence of long COVID and find COVID-19 therapies that can potentially prevent the development of PASC.
In the present investigation, the efficacy of early outpatient therapy of COVID-19 patients with fluvoxamine, ivermectin, or metformin was evaluated in a large-scale, quadruple-blinded, randomized, placebo-controlled, phase three clinical trial. In order to determine whether the early treatment prevented PASC, a 300-day follow-up was performed.
The participants were overweight or obese people between the ages of 30 and 85 who had recently tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 and had no prior history of COVID-19. Frequent use of any of the three drugs under study or an emergency usage-permitted therapy with any of the three medications resulted in a participant’s exclusion; however, COVID-19 immunization was not a requirement for exclusion. Women who were pregnant or nursing were included in the study, In the present investigation, the efficacy of early outpatient therapy of COVID-19 patients with fluvoxamine, ivermectin, or metformin was evaluated in a large-scale, quadruple-blinded, randomized, placebo-controlled, phase three clinical trial. In order to determine whether the early treatment prevented PASC, a 300-day follow-up was performed.
In the present investigation, the efficacy of early outpatient therapy of COVID-19 patients with fluvoxamine, ivermectin, or metformin was evaluated in a large-scale, quadruple-blinded, randomized, placebo-controlled, phase three clinical trial. In order to assess whether the early treatment prevented PASC, a 300-day follow-up was performed.
The participants were overweight or obese people between the ages of 30 and 85 who had recently tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 and had no prior history of COVID-19. Frequent use of any of the three drugs under study or an emergency usage-permitted therapy with any of the three medications resulted in a participant’s exclusion; however, COVID-19 immunization was not a requirement for exclusion.
The findings indicated that early outpatient treatment of COVID-19 patients with metformin resulted in a relative decrease of 42% and an absolute decrease of 4.3% in the incidence of long COVID, compared to a placebo, and reduced the long COVID hazard ratio to 0.58. Treatment with ivermectin and fluvoxamine did not show similar results. Among the group treated with metformin, the incidence rate of long COVID was 6.3% as compared to the placebo group, which reported a 10.6% long COVID incidence rate. Furthermore, metformin treatment was also seen to reduce the incidence of severe COVID-19-related hospitalization, emergency department visits, and mortality by 40%.
The cumulative long COVID incidence among the group treated with ivermectin was 8%, as compared to those treated with the placebo, who had a long COVID incidence rate of 7.5%, indicating that ivermectin did not have any long COVID preventative benefits. Similarly, the fluvoxamine treatment group had a long COVID incidence rate of 10.1%, as compared to the placebo group, which had an incidence rate of 7.5%.
