What Is the Single-Pill COVID-19 Cure? (GoodRx)

 

You may be wondering if there will ever be a pill you can take at home to prevent or treat COVID-19. We don’t have one yet, but there’s good news. Pfizer is studying a new drug that may be available soon to treat COVID-19 with a single pill. Keep reading to find out more about what the drug is, how it treats COVID-19, and when it may be available.  

How would a single-pill COVID treatment work?

Pfizer is studying a new drug called PF-07321332 to see if it can be used in pill or capsule form to treat COVID-19. The hope is that the pill can be used to treat people with mild illness at home without the need for hospitalization. It’s possible it could also be used to prevent COVID-19 after an exposure to the virus. 

PF-07321332 is a protease inhibitor. It works by blocking a SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) protease. A protease is an enzyme that allows the virus to break down proteins so it can multiply by making copies of itself. Blocking the protease prevents the virus from reproducing so it can’t continue to cause infection.

What other conditions do protease inhibitors treat?

Protease inhibitors are not new drugs. Other protease inhibitors are already used to treat infections caused by viruses like hepatitis C and HIV. 

The FDA approved the first protease inhibitor used to treat HIV, saquinavir (Invirase), about 25 years ago. Before protease inhibitors were available for HIV treatment, other drugs called nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors or NRTIs were used. NRTIs work by blocking an enzyme called reverse transcriptase that HIV uses to make copies of itself. 

NRTIs did help people with HIV, but the virus quickly became resistant to these drugs. Once the virus becomes resistant, the drug no longer works, and the virus can continue to multiply and cause infection.  

Once protease inhibitors became available, HIV treatment improved. Scientists found that using protease inhibitors in combination with NRTIs was better than either alone. Using the drugs together helped prevent the virus from becoming resistant to treatment. 

They found people with HIV receiving the drug combination had low or undetectable levels of the virus in their blood. This means the drugs prevented the infection from getting worse. In fact, the combination of a protease inhibitor with two NRTIs decreased the number of people with HIV who progressed to AIDS or died from their disease by about 50%.

What stage of development is the pill currently in?

The pill is currently being studied in a phase 1 clinical trial. This means it is the first time it is being tested in humans. A drug has to go through four trial phases before scientists know if it is safe and effective.  

Phase 1 is used to test whether the drug is safe in humans and to test different doses of the drug. If this phase is successful, the drug will move on to testing in phase 2 and then phase 3. In these phases, it will be tested on increasingly larger groups of people to see how well it works in bigger populations. According to the FDA, about 70% of drugs move on to phase 2. Phase 4 trials are done after FDA approval so the drug can be monitored for safety as more people start taking it. 

Would this cover all strains of the COVID-19 virus?

We don’t know for sure yet, but the pill is likely to work against all strains of the COVID-19 virus, according to Pfizer. The protease blocked by Pfizer’s drug, called the 3C-like protease, is actually found in other types of coronaviruses, and it is not at high risk for mutating like other parts of the virus. Pfizer found PF-07321332 was effective against other types of coronaviruses like MERS when tested in the lab. 

Will I still need the pill if I’ve already received the COVID-19 vaccine?

The COVID-19 vaccines are very effective, but it is still possible to get COVID-19 even if you are vaccinated. For this reason, it is very likely that you may be able to take the pill if you get COVID-19 after being vaccinated, but we don’t know for sure. More research needs to be done before we will know exactly who can take the pill. 

When will the pill be available to the public?

We don’t know an exact date yet since the drug is still in the early stages of clinical trials. But Pfizer has said the pill could be available by the end of this year. This could change, so be sure to check back for more information.

The bottom line 

Pfizer is studying a treatment for COVID-19 that can be given in a single pill. This is exciting news, and it may be available as soon as the end of the year. 

It is important to remember, however, that the drug is just starting to be studied in people. We don’t know the details yet about who can take it, how safe it is, how well it works, or what the side effects are. Stay tuned for more information.

Sarah Pozniak, MD is a board-certified internal medicine physician. She cares for patients with acute and chronic medical conditions as a primary care physician in Washington, D.C.

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