COVID: early use of lopinavir/ritonavir with ribavirin and IFN beta-1b
A new study found that adding ribavirin plus interferon beta-1b to lopinavir/ritonavir over just taking lopinavir/ritonavir alone significantly decreased SARS-CoV-2 viral loads and hospital stays in patients with early/mild Covid-19 ( see covid early triple therapy helps lancet2020 in dropbox, or doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)31042-4) Details: --127 patients in Hong Kong were randomized to a 14-day combo of lopinavir 400mg/ritonavir 100mg bid (41 patients) vs that plus ribavirin 400mg bid and 3 doses of 8 million international units of interferon beta-1b (86 patients) --the interferon beta-1b was only used if patients were within 7 days of symptom onset, for fear of its proinflammatory effects --all patients had to have NEWS2 score of at least 1 (see below) and symptom duration of <14 days --median age 54, 54% male --40% had underlying diseases: hypertension 32%, hyperlipidemia 27%, diabetes 15%, ...