The drug was developed by scientists at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center in Tel Aviv, Israel. The drug trial is currently in phase 2 and is being conducted on Covid-19 patients in Athens, Greece, according to The Jerusalem Post.
The trial is being conducted in Greece because there are not enough suitable patients in Israel for the study. The head of the trial in Greece is Professor Sotiris Tsiodras, one of Greece’s leading experts on the coronavirus.
The new drug developed by Israeli scientists can help 90% of Covid-19 patients be discharged within just 5 days.
The new drug is named EXO-CD24 and has been used to treat 90 patients with severe Covid-19 in Greece. The results showed that 93% of these patients were discharged after 5 days, with some even being discharged earlier. This is a phase 2 trial, following a phase 1 trial conducted in Israel at the end of 2020. At that time, the drug helped 29 out of 30 patients with moderate to severe Covid-19 recover in just a few days.
“The goal of the study is to test whether the drug is safe. So far, we have not recorded any significant side effects during the two phases of the trial,” said Professor Nadir Arber, a member of the research team.
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Professor Arber and his colleagues developed the EXO-CD24 drug based on the CD24 molecule that they have been studying for 25 years. This molecule naturally exists in the human body.
For patients with Covid-19, one of the biggest risks is the cytokine storm. This is a condition where the immune system is overactivated and attacks healthy cells in the lungs. The new drug targets this issue and helps balance the cytokine storm.
CD24 is a small protein that can bind to cell membranes, affecting many bodily functions, including the regulation of the mechanism that causes cytokine storms. The EXO-CD24 drug does not significantly affect the immune system but specifically targets the mechanism that causes cytokine storms, scientists say.
Currently, the research team is preparing to launch the final phase of the trial, according to The Jerusalem Post.
