The Japanese figured out how to cure the flu for a day
Last reviewed: 16.10.2021
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Japanese pharmacists have developed a drug that successfully copes with a viral infection in just 24 hours - it's much faster than any similar antiviral drugs.
Representative of the pharmaceutical company Shionogi & Co said that the medicine that destroys the pathogen of the flu for 24 hours is ready for production . If we consider that at the moment the most effective of existing means in this direction copes with this task for three days, then this is really a breakthrough in medicine.
A new medicine called Balkoxavir marboxil. According to the creators, in order to overcome influenza infection, it is enough to take only one single dose of this medication. Agree - both convenient and profitable. So far, the minimum course of these drugs has been five days, with the frequency of taking twice a day (this is one of the most common and effective drugs against the flu is Oseltamivir, better known as Tamiflu). And the convenience of reception is not the only advantage. As doctors explain, early withdrawal of the antiviral drug can lead to the emergence of resistance of the virus to the drug. And with the new drug, everything is greatly simplified: I took one dose of medicine - and expect the result.
The new drug belongs to the group of drugs-inhibitors of endonucleases. Its property is to inhibit the activity of endonuclease proteins, which help the virus infection spread throughout the body. Influenza viruses spread through the retention of specific structures that make up the cell RNA. Endonucleases promote the "separation" of part of the RNA of the cell, and on the basis of the retained structure, the infection begins to reproduce. If the activation of these proteins is inhibited, the cell acquires antiviral resistance.
In early 2018, scientists completed the third phase of clinical trials of this medication. Experiments involving patients infected with influenza demonstrated that the new agent does not practically change the duration of the course of symptoms of infectious disease. But, thanks to this medicine, the viruses were destroyed already during the day - this means, first of all, that the patient already the next day practically does not pose a danger to others.
As indicated in the periodical The Asahi Shimbun, the Ministry of Health of Japan has approved the right to release a new medication. It remains only to wait for the published permission - this should happen already in March this year.
Information tools do not specify when exactly the newest antifungal agent will go on sale, and in which countries, except Japan, it can be purchased. Most likely, the first action of the drug will be experienced by the Japanese. We will observe from the outside, how such a medicine, so necessary in the period of massive influenza outbreaks, will manifest itself.
On the latest development reports online resource Naked Science.