India approved 2DG anti COVID oral drug developed by defence scientists

India gets the first batch of new anti-COVID drug 2-DG. Indian defence scientists have pitched in to fight the Chinese Corona Virus.

The first consignment of the country’s first anti-covid oral drug 2-DG handed over to the Union Health Minister Harshvardhan by Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh. An anti-Covid oral drug developed by the DRDO has been approved by the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) for emergency use as an adjunct therapy in moderate to severe coronavirus patient.

The drug developed by the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences in collaboration with Dr Reddy’s Laboratories will help patients with Corona to reduce dependency on oxygen and to recover soon.

The Drug 2-deoxy-D-glucose recently got approval for emergency use by the Drugs Controller General of India, DCGI. The clinical trial results have shown that this molecule helps in the faster recovery of hospitalised patients and reduces supplemental oxygen dependence.

The officials informed, “The first batch of 10,000 doses of 2DG medicine for the treatment of COVID-19 infected patients would be launched early next week and will be given to patients.

The drug manufacturers are working on ramping up the production of the medicine for future use. The drug has been developed by a team of DRDO scientists including Dr Anant Narayan Bhatt”, informed DRDO officials.

“An anti-COVID-19 therapeutic application of the drug 2-deoxy-D-glucose (2-DG) has been developed by Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS), a lab of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), in collaboration with Dr Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL), Hyderabad”, informed an official release by Ministry of Defence.

Clinical trial results have shown that this molecule helps in faster recovery of hospitalised patients and reduces supplemental oxygen dependence. Higher proportion of patients treated with 2-DG showed RT-PCR negative conversion in COVID patients. The drug will be of immense benefit to the people suffering from COVID-19.

Pursuing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call for preparedness against the pandemic, DRDO took the initiative of developing anti-COVID therapeutic application of 2-DG. In April 2020, during the first wave of the pandemic, INMAS-DRDO scientists conducted laboratory experiments with the help of Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad and found that this molecule works effectively against SARS-CoV-2 virus and inhibits the viral growth.

Based on these results, Drugs Controller General of India’s (DCGI) Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) permitted Phase-II clinical trial of 2-DG in COVID-19 patients in May 2020.

The DRDO, along with its industry partner DRL, Hyderabad, started the clinical trials to test the safety and efficacy of the drug in COVID-19 patients. In Phase-II trials (including dose ranging) conducted during May to October 2020, the drug was found to be safe in COVID-19 patients and showed significant improvement in their recovery. Phase IIa was conducted in six hospitals and Phase IIb (dose ranging) clinical trial was conducted at 11 hospitals all over the country. Phase-II trial was conducted on 110 patients.

In efficacy trends, the patients treated with 2-DG showed faster symptomatic cure than Standard of Care (SoC) on various endpoints. A significantly favourable trend (2.5 days difference) was seen in terms of the median time to achieving normalisation of specific vital signs parameters when compared to SoC.

Based on successful results, DCGI further permitted the Phase-III clinical trials in November 2020. The Phase-III clinical trial was conducted on 220 patients between December 2020 to March 2021 at 27 COVID hospitals in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The detailed data of phase-III clinical trial was presented to DCGI.

In 2-DG arm, significantly higher proportion of patients improved symptomatically and became free from supplemental oxygen dependence (42 per cent vs 31 per cent) by Day-3 in comparison to SoC, indicating an early relief from Oxygen therapy/dependence.

The similar trend was observed in patients aged more than 65 years. On May 01, 2021, DCGI granted permission for Emergency Use of this drug as adjunct therapy in moderate to severe COVID-19 patients. Being a generic molecule and analogue of glucose, it can be easily produced and made available in plenty in the country.

The drug comes in powder form in sachet, which is taken orally by dissolving it in water. It accumulates in thevirus-infected cells and prevents virus growth by stopping viral synthesis and energy production. Its selective accumulation in virally infected cells makes this drug unique.

In the ongoing second COVID-19 wave, a large number of patients are facing severe oxygen dependency and need hospitalisation. The drug is expected to save precious lives due to the mechanism of operation of the drug in infected cells. This also reduces the hospital stay of COVID-19 patients.

Sources: Business Standard, DRDO, Social Media,