Approved MS Drug Inhibits Replication of SARS-CoV-2 in Human Lung Cells and Fights Immune Reaction Killing COVID-19 Patients

A drug which has already been approved for the treatment of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients effectively inhibits the coronavirus when tested on human lung cells and, at the same time, fights the immune reaction that is killing COVID-19 patients around the world.

In a new study, biomedicine researchers at the Aarhus University (Aarhus, Denmark) have shown that a drug called dimethyl fumarate (DMF), which is approved for the treatment of MS patients, inhibits the growth of a range of viruses in the body’s cells and that this includes the coronavirus (SARS-CoV2) – at least when the researchers test it in a test tube.

When the pandemic struck, the biomedicine researchers were in the process of testing the effects of a drug which was virtually identical with a particular sclerosis medicine, namely a substance called 4-octyl-itaconate, which is used on e.g. the herpes virus, smallpox virus (vaccinia virus) and zika virus, and which is also known to lead to foetal defects – all as part of the hunt for a broad spectrum antiviral medication. And their testing succeeded beyond expectations. The number of duplications that the coronavirus makes of itself in the body's cells was drastically reduced. At the same time, the drug inhibited the immune reaction or inflammatory condition that constitutes a large portion of the actual threat for coronavirus patients.

When the research group saw the encouraging results with 4-octyl-itaconate, they repeated the tests with a corresponding approved product, DMF, which showed virtually the same inhibitory effect. This means that the effect of DMF can be tested on corona patients ‘here and now’, if clinicians in Denmark or abroad – and the company that holds the patent – are prepared to test it in human trials.

"You can really save a lot of time when you’re testing a medication that has already been approved and tested in another context," said Christian Kanstrup Holm, an associate professor at the Department of Biomedicine at Aarhus University, with reference to the statutory phases involved in getting a medication approved from scratch.

"As we’re doing basic research, we obviously don’t know whether the drug works on infections in humans, and it’s up to the infectious disease experts to test for this. However, I have to say that I’m very optimistic," added Holm.

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