Eye medicine turns out to be effective against COVID-19

A cure for eye disease proved effective against COVID-19. This was the conclusion reached by a team of specialists led by staff at the University of California, Los Angeles. The results were published in the journal PLOS Biology.

The drug studied verteporfin is usually used to eliminate certain blood vessels in the eye in the degeneration of the yellow spot and has already been approved for use by the FDA (Office of the Food and Drug Administration U.S.). Now it's also found to be effective in treating coronavirus.

During the experiments, scientists looked at tissue samples from people infected with the coronavirus, as well as cultured human heart and lung cells. The researchers then tracked changes in genes associated with the Hippo signaling pathway. They also studied the YAP protein, which suspends its activity when Hippo is activated.

They found that in cultured human cells, the original SARS-CoV-2 strain and its delta variant activated the Hippo pathway in the first few days after infection. When the scientists inhibited this pathway and increased the amount of YAP protein, the virus began to multiply more strongly. When the cells were exposed to verteporfin, which blocks YAP, the concentration of coronavirus was lower than that of the control group, where more than 60,000 virus particles per milliliter were observed.

The authors concluded that verteporfin has the potential to be a full-fledged treatment for COVID-19, and because it is already FDA approved, clinical trials to study its safety and effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 could begin soon.

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