An anti-COVID-19 therapeutic drug developed by DRDO called drug2-deoxy-D-glucose (2-DG) has been given emergency approval by the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) for Coronavirus patients in the country. The anti-Covid-19 drug was developed by DRDO last year and has undergone three phases of clinical trials between April 2020 and March 2021.
The drug was developed by the Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS), a lab of DRDO, in collaboration with Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, Hyderabad,has been found to be effective in controlling the viral growth, resulting in faster recovery of hospitalised patients, DCGI said.
According to the report, the results of the third phase of the clinical trial of the drug have shown that this molecule helps in the faster recovery of hospitalised patients and reduces supplemental oxygen dependence.
A higher proportion of patients treated with 2-DG showed RT-PCR negative conversion, said the report.
“A significantly favourable trend (2.5 days difference) was seen in terms of the median time to achieving normalization of specific vital signs parameters when compared to SOC,” DRDO said.
How the 2-DG (2-deoxy-D-glucose) drug formulation works
The drug comes in powder form in sachets, which is taken orally by dissolving it in water.It accumulates in the virus-infected cells and prevents virus growth by stopping viral synthesis and energy production. Its selective accumulation in virally infected cells makes this drug unique
India saw a record 4,187 fatalities due to COVID-19 in a single day, taking the country’s death toll to 2,38,270, while 4,01,078 new infections were reported in a day, pushing the tally to 2,18,92,676, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on the day. Registering a steady increase, the active cases have increased to 37,23,446, comprising 17.01 percent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has dropped to 81.90 percent, the data updated at 8 am showed.
Amid the surge in COVID-19 cases, the drug seems to be of immense benefit to the people suffering from the infection
