Department of Pathology, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD 20814, United States of America.
Microbes Infect. 2020 May-Jun;22(4-5):154-156. doi: 10.1016/j.micinf.2020.04.004. Epub 2020 Apr 17.
Novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is the most recent health care crisis without specific prophylactic or therapeutic drugs. Antimalarial drug chloroquine (CHL) and its safer derivative hydroxychloroquine (HCHL) have been proposed to be repurposed to treat SARS coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), the causative agent of COVID-19. CHL/HCHL have anti-inflammatory activity and are used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis and lupus. Although, CHL/HCHL have an anti-viral activity against several viruses in cell-cultures, the anti-viral activity in-vivo is questionable. Repurposing of CHL/HCHL to treat SARS-CoV-2 infection is appealing. However, there is empirical evidence from animal studies with other viruses suggesting that CHL/HCHL may have an untoward paradoxical effect. One thus cannot exclude the possibility that CHL may increase the severity of the disease and prove deleterious both for the patients and public health efforts to contain the highly contagious and explosive spread of SARS-CoV-2.
新型冠状病毒病 2019(COVID-19)大流行是最近的一次卫生保健危机,没有特定的预防或治疗药物。抗疟药物氯喹(CHL)及其更安全的衍生物羟氯喹(HCHL)已被提议重新用于治疗 SARS 冠状病毒-2(SARS-CoV-2),这是 COVID-19 的致病因子。CHL/HCHL 具有抗炎活性,用于治疗类风湿性关节炎、骨关节炎和狼疮。虽然 CHL/HCHL 在细胞培养物中对几种病毒具有抗病毒活性,但体内的抗病毒活性尚不确定。重新利用 CHL/HCHL 治疗 SARS-CoV-2 感染很有吸引力。然而,来自其他病毒的动物研究的经验证据表明,CHL/HCHL 可能具有意想不到的矛盾作用。因此,不能排除 CHL 可能会使疾病加重,并对患者和公共卫生努力控制 SARS-CoV-2 的高传染性和爆炸性传播造成有害影响。