What are Anti Microbe drugs and can they fight coronavirus?

Scientists in Hong Kong says that anti-microbe drug is successful against coronavirus. They stated that an affordable anti-microbial drug used to treat stomach ulcers and bacterial infections and has shown promise in combatting the coronavirus in animals.

Researchers are studying and exploring metallodrugs, compounds that contain metal and are more commonly used against bacteria may additionally have antiviral properties that would fight the SARS CoV-2 coronavirus.

What are Anti Microbe drugs?

Antimicrobials are medicines that are used to prevent and treat infections in humans, animals, and plants. It includes antibiotics, antivirals, antifungals, and antiparasitics. Or we can say that it is a drug that is used to treat a microbial infection.

What is antimicrobial resistance?

It occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites change over time and no longer respond to medicines that generate infections harder to treat and increases the risk of disease spread, severe illness, and death.

And as a result due to drug resistance, antibiotics and other antimicrobial medicines become ineffective and infections become increasingly difficult or impossible to treat.

How anti-microbe drugs can fight against coronavirus or what do researchers say about it?

Scientists used Syrian hamsters as test subjects and they found that one of the drugs, ranitidine bismuth citrate (RBC) was a "potent anti-SARS-CoV-2 agent."

According to the Hong Kong University researcher Runming Wang and the team "RBC is able to lower the viral load in the lung of the infected hamster by tenfold."

And further he told that "our findings demonstrate that RBC is a potential anti-viral agent for COVID-19."

Also stated that RBC was a commonly available drug used against stomach ulcers with a safe and comprehensive pharmacological profile. Mr. Wang also told that "It is been used for decades and so it is pretty safe." Their research has been published in the Journal Nature Microbiology.

As we know that all over the world more than a million people are killed due to coronavirus. It emerged in China for the first time and then it spread across the world.

Scientists are trying and doing research in search of a vaccine and they have also been scouring readily available drugs that might alleviate symptoms that are caused by the COVID-19 disease or help the body to fight against infection.

Two drugs namely Remdesivir which is a broad-spectrum antiviral drug and another one dexamethasone which is a type of corticosteroid. Both have been identified as having some success against the virus. But they have certain types of drawbacks. It is said that Remdesivir is an expensive drug and there is a shortage globally whereas dexamethasone has immunosuppression effects and is risky. Some say that other drug cocktails have shown liver damage and can be a risk.

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