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Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - Jordan is following up with great interest on the results of the use of drug remdesivir to treat coronavirus (COVID-19) patients, said member of the National Epidemiological Committee Wael Hayajneh.

He told Petra in an interview Saturday that clinical trials of the drug in the United States found out that it reduces hospital stay time for people with coronavirus from 15 days to 11 days.

Hayajneh, who is also in charge of the coronavirus file in the north of the Kingdom, said that clinical trials showed that the new drug reduces the death rate from 11.6 per cent to 8 per cent, adding that "it appears that the US Food and Drug Administration is heading toward approving it for people infected with the virus."

He pointed out that Jordan is currently using the drug Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) for patients with coronavirus, and is tracking any new information about the new US drug and the other types of drugs.

He emphasized that remisdivir is so far being used for research purposes, and is not available in Jordan, and that "it's been positively looked at the accumulative studies around it."

However, he said, the normal period for the production of any vaccine is 8 to 10 years in order to be safe and effective.

Yesterday, the US Food and Drug Administration announced it granted remdesivir emergency use authorization to treat the most severely ill COVID-19 patients.

The antiviral drug, which was previously used to treat Ebola, is the first drug given authorization for the treatment of COVID-19.