Pfizer Says COVID-19 Pill Is 89% Effective in Preliminary Study
Friday, November 05, 2021
Pfizer announced Friday that a preliminary look at study results indicated that its experimental new pill was highly effective at preventing people at high risk of severe COVID-19 from needing hospitalization or dying, the latest encouraging performance for an early virus treatment.
The study needs to be peer-reviewed and will need FDA and CDC approval.
According to Pfizer, the drug cut the risk of hospitalization or death in study subjects with mild to moderate COVID-19 by about 89% if they took the pill within three days of diagnosis.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTMore than 727,000 Americans have died from COVID and in RI 2,881 have died.
The drug, called Paxlovid, was also found to be generally safe and well-tolerated in the early look at ongoing study results, the company said.
Pfizer plans to ask the Food and Drug Administration to authorize the drug’s use this month, and the company could deliver doses this year should regulators give a thumbs-up, Pfizer Chief Scientific Officer Mikael Dolsten said.
“It’s stunning data,” Dolsten said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. ”I feel very optimistic on a day like this. For everyone living in this pandemic, a new light of hope has turned on.”
Pfizer has already begun to share with the FDA information about the drug needed for regulatory reviews, such as how it will be made, Dolsten said.
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