Pneumonia patients who have been infected by the 2019 novel Corona virus (2019-nCoV) have started taking the antiviral Remdesivir developed by US pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences, Inc. as part of the clinical trial to ascertain the effectiveness of the drug.
The research, led by the China-Japan Friendship Hospital and the Institute of Materia Medica under the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS), will be implemented across several facilities in Wuhan.
761 patients will be part of the trials 41% of whom have moderate infection and 59% are severely infected.
Remdesivir was initially developed to treat the Ebola and Margburg viruses.
To date, a total of 636 deaths due to the 2019-nCoV has been reported with most of the fatalities coming from the province of Hubei.
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