As you read this, Kenya has been approved to commence the trial of experimental drugs for patients under hospitalization due to the Covid-19 pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO).
According to a report by International Standard Randomised Controlled Trial (ISRCT), a global registry where all human clinical trials are listed and accredited by WHO, Kenya can now begin recruiting participants for the project dubbed ‘solidarity’.
“There are currently no available vaccines or treatments for Covid-19. Although there have been some suggestions for untested treatments that could be added to the usual care in hospitals, none is known to help.
“The World Health Organization (WHO) is, therefore, organizing a study in many countries in which some of these untested treatments are compared with each other, to discover whether any do help,” ISRCT announced of the initiative.
According to the program, the study treatments being considered are remdesivir, chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir plus ritonavir, and interferon-beta, given as daily pills or as daily injections.The requirements for the trials have it that adults (aged over 18 years) hospitalized with definite Covid-19 and not already receiving any of the study drugs are free to volunteer for the trials.
It will, however, not be possible for people to volunteer themselves or their relatives to participate in the drug trials.