The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) epidemic is yet to be fully arrested. Despite great achievements in COVID-19 research and good therapeutic effects of many antiviral drugs against COVID-19, a simple oral antiviral drug for COVID-19 is still needed. A meta-analysis investigated the improvement in mortality or hospitalization rates and adverse events among COVID-19 patients with three new oral antivirals (molnupiravir, fluvoxamine and Paxlovid) by exploring scientific and medical databases for relevant articles and screening the references of retrieved studies on COVID-19.

The following results were obtained-

• 8 studies were included for analysis. 
• The drug group included 2440 COVID-19 patients, with 54 patients who died or were hospitalized. 
• The control group included a total of 2348 COVID-19 patients, with 118 patients who died or were hospitalized. 
• The overall odds ratio (OR) of mortality or hospitalization was found to be 0.33 for COVID-19 patients in the drug group and placebo group, suggesting the effectiveness of oral antiviral drugs in COVID-19 patients and reducing the mortality or hospitalization by approximately 67%.

Thus this study proved the effectiveness of three novel oral antivirals (molnupiravir, fluvoxamine and Paxlovid) in reducing the mortality and hospitalization rates in patients with COVID-19. Further, they did not increase the occurrence of adverse events and exhibited good overall safety. 

SOURCE- Annals of Medicine, 2022;54(1): 516-523. DOI: 10.1080/07853890.2022.2034936