As world waits for COVID-19 cure, Gilead's experimental drug remdesivir shows encouraging results on patients in US

As the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic outbreak spreads like wildfire across the globe, the entire world is laying in anxious wait for a cure or a vaccine to combat the virus which has brought normal life to a standstill as almost the entirety of human race have been forced to go into self-isolation and home-quarantine as major cities remain in strict lockdown, all in fear of the virus.

In this regard, much is banking on Gilead Sciences, Inc., a research-based biopharmaceutical company, whose experimental drug 'remdesivir' reportedly showed positive responses in severe COVID-19- affected patients, according to reports by a medical news website STAT. To further the case, the University of Chicago Medical Center, participating in a study of the antiviral medication, said that it is seeing encouraging reports, including rapid recoveries of fever and respiratory symptoms, in almost all patients who were a part of the remdesivir trials last week.

The US company's shares leapt more than 15% in after-hours trading following the report of its experimental drug swiftly tamping down both fever and respiratory symptoms, working wonders in COVID-19-affected patients.

The hospital recruited 125 patients into two phase 3 studies, including 113 with severe disease. The study has no control arm, with all of the patients receiving daily infusions of remdesivir. The industry watchers are now waiting for data from Gilead's own controlled phase 3 study to know for sure. They expect results from its Phase 3 study in patients with severe COVID-19 infection at the end of this month, and additional data from other studies to become available in May.

Meanwhile, Gilead, in an emailed statement on Thursday, said, "The totality of the data needs to be analyzed in order to draw any conclusions from the trial."

Remdesivir, which was originally tested in Ebola patients, has emerged as one of the top near-term hopes for COVID-19 patients. In addition to carrying out its own clinical trials, Gilead has made the drug available to studies run by other sponsors, as well as to more than 1,700 people on a compassionate use basis. Last week, the New England Journal of Medicine published data from 53 patients with severe disease, but that data set also lacked a control group.

Meanwhile, the global coronavirus deaths on Friday crossed the 1.4 lakh mark with the United States registering the highest death toll of over 34,000.

The US has recorded 670,353 cases and 34,617 deaths while Italy is second in terms of death toll with 22,170 casualties. Italy is behind the US and Spain in terms of the total number of cases with 168,941 reported COVID-19 infections.

Out of the 2.1 million recorded infections globally, nearly half of which are in Europe making it the hardest hit continent in the world.

The pandemic has created an unprecedented crisis for the modern world has forced nearly half the world population to live under strict lockdown including in India where 1.3 billion people are currently forced to stay at home as the government announced an extension to the nationwide lockdown.

Meanwhile, the number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in India climbed to 13,387 on Friday with the death toll reaching 437. The 13,387 total coronavirus-positive cases in India include 11,201 active cases, 1,749 cured, discharged, or migrated patients and 437 deaths. In the last 24 hours, 1,007 new cases and 23 deaths were reported.