Covid-19 roundup: Sh­iono­gi’s an­tivi­ral pill hits the mark; Ocu­gen strikes deal for in­tranasal vac­cine

Japan­ese phar­ma Sh­iono­gi’s Covid-19 an­tivi­ral against Omi­cron passed its Phase III tri­al in Asia, meet­ing its pri­ma­ry end­point.

The drug, a pro­tease in­hibitor known as en­sitrelvir, was ad­min­is­tered dai­ly for five days and led to a sig­nif­i­cant re­duc­tion in symp­toms such as stuffy or run­ny nose, sore throat, cough, feel­ing hot or fever­ish, and low en­er­gy or tired­ness with­in 72 hours of its on­set, the com­pa­ny an­nounced Wednes­day. A to­tal of 1,821 most­ly vac­ci­nat­ed pa­tients from Japan, South Ko­rea and Viet­nam were en­rolled in the study.

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