Pfizer Reports Failure Of Paxlovid Treatment To Avoid Family Getting Infected

Posted by: Kyeyune Andrew Jonathan in World news April 30, 2022

Pfizer Inc. recently carried out a large trial for its Covid-19 treatment, the oral antiviral treatment Paxlovid. However, on Friday, they said the drug failed to prevent coronavirus infections in people living with someone infected with the virus.

At the start of the trial, up to 3000 adults who were household contacts to an individual experiencing symptoms and had recently tested positive for COVID-19 enrolled.

They received either Paxlovid for five or 10 days or a placebo.

They found those who took the five-day course 32% less likely to become infected than the placebo group. That rose to 37% with 10 days of Paxlovid.

The results, however, turned out to be statistically insignificant and thus possibly due to chance.

According to Pfizer, safety data from previous studies showed consistency. This means that the pills had appeared 90% effective in preventing hospitalization or death in COVID-19 patients.

“While we are disappointed in the outcome of this particular study. These results do not impact the strong efficacy and safety data we’ve observed in our earlier trial for the treatment of COVID-19 patients,” Pfizer Chief Executive Albert Bourla said in a statement.

Pfizer said Paxlovid, which consists of two different antiviral drugs, is currently approved or authorized. However, it is for conditional or emergency use in more than 60 countries to treat high-risk COVID-19 patients.

Projections show that sales of Paxlovid, part of a class of drugs known as protease inhibitors, will reach $24 billion this year. This is according to Wall Street forecasts compiled by Refinitiv.  

Shares of Pfizer, which fell 3% in regular trading, were down another 1%, at $48.53, after hours.

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