the essential At the start of 2022, new treatments will be released which will make it possible to fight against Covid-19. Medicines, treatments, vaccines… La Dépêche du Midi takes stock of the new solutions arriving on the market. The Omicron wave “will be the last with so many restrictions”. Charged with optimism, the CEO of the Pfizer laboratory, Albert Bourla, announced this Monday, January 17, the changeover, and a possible return to “the life before” very soon. The objective: “to live with viruses” by relying on the “tools created by science”, according to the director. Not effective enough to prevent or cure serious forms of Covid-19, since the start of the health crisis two years ago, many drugs have been developed without convincing. And now, in this month of January, the scientific community is preparing to lift the veil on new products which could make it possible to fight in the long term against SARS-CoV-2. La Dépêche du Midi takes stock.
The “Paxlovid”, the Pfizer pill
The arrival of the “Paxlovid” pill, developed by Pfizer, is expected by the end of January in French pharmacies. Pfizer has developed a pill that is similar in many ways to Monulpavir (an antiviral drug developed by the Merck laboratory). According to the results of clinical trials published by the Pfizer laboratory, if drug treatment with Paxlovid is correctly followed within three days of the onset of symptoms, it would reduce deaths and hospitalizations linked to Covid-19 by 89%.
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Covid-19: efficacy, marketing… six questions about Paxlovid, Pfizer’s pill against the virus In practice, for a patient infected with Covid-19, it would then be a matter of combining two pills, twice a day , for five days, to prevent serious forms of Covid-19.
“Sotrovimab”, monoclonal antibodies
It is a method that has come a long way since March 2021: monoclonal antibody treatments are on the rise. According to the National Agency for the Safety of Medicines (ANSM), it is a question of isolating an antibody in someone who has already been contaminated by Covid-19, of reproducing it in large quantities in the laboratory. They are then reinjected by infusion into infected patients, in order to avoid serious forms of the virus.
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Covid-19: two new treatments recommended by the WHO in very specific cases Several treatments have been tested, but not all of them are effective against the Omicron variant. This is the case, among others, of Bamlanivimab, or even Ronapreve, acclaimed by the former President of the United States, Donald Trump. On the other hand, Xevudy (or sotrovimab) has proven its worth: it has been recommended by the World Health Organization. The structure recommends Xevudy to Covid-positive patients at high risk of hospitalization. It will be available in France at the end of January.
The Novavax vaccine, the newcomer
This is the 5th vaccine to be authorized in France: Novavax (designed by the American company of the same name) is based on so-called “classic” technology. The technology it uses is not messenger RNA, on which the vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna, by far the most injected in France, are based. It is, like childhood vaccines already widely used, a so-called “subunit” vaccine, based on proteins that trigger an immune response, without viruses.
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Covid-19: what we know about the Novavax vaccine, which should arrive in France in February symptomatic forms. On January 14, the High Authority for Health gave the green light for use as a primary vaccination in people aged 18 and over. The first deliveries of Novavax’s vaccine (marketed as Nuvaxovid) are expected to take place in early February, the health ministry said.
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