Page 30 - COVID-19-Mortality-review-in-Malaysia-and-updates-on-clinical-management-of-COVID-19

Treatment Likely To Be Effective Only If Given Early

Early on, there was a randomized study done by the Chinese group that looked at
Kaletra (lopinavir-ritonavir), a HIV drug repurposed to treat COVID-19 [5]. The final

result of the study showed that lopinavir-ritonavir did not make a difference.
However, some information came out from that study that we need to give antivirals

early. The first graph showed that there is no lopinavir-ritonavir given for less than 10
days of illness. When lopinavir-ritonavir was given for less than 10 days of illness, it
makes a difference with regard to the number of people who become COVID-19

negative. Overall, the final results showed no difference but it looks like for antiviral to
work, it needs to be given early.

Diagram 12: Findings from the study on impact of lopinavir-ritonavir on COVID-19
patients by Yan et al.