Pfizer's Paxlovid fails as 15-day treatment for long COVID

8/6/2024 7:27

        A 15-day course of Pfizer's COVID-19 antiviral treatment Paxlovid did not relieve symptoms of long COVID, according a study by Stanford University researchers.
        
        Currently, there are no proven treatments specifically for long COVID in which a host of symptoms can last for many months after initial coronavirus infection.
        
        Scientists and patients had hoped that Pfizer's two-drug oral treatment would ease symptoms of long COVID after anecdotal reports of patients who said Paxlovid helped them.
        
        But the 15-week, 155-participant study failed to show that a 15-day course helped more than a placebo in reducing fatigue, brain fog, shortness of breath, body aches, or gastrointestinal or cardiovascular symptoms. Trial participants, on average, had been sick more than 16 months before enrolling in the trial.
        
        "We did not see a measurable difference based on patient reported outcomes in the six composite symptoms together," Stanford Medicine Professor Dr. Upinder Singh said in an interview. "We didn't see a benefit in individual symptoms either."