AstraZeneca diabetes drug tanks in Covid-19 trial
AstraZeneca has confirmed this morning that its late-stage coronavirus study results, testing whether its diabetes drug could treat Covid-19, has tanked.
Its diabetes drug Farxiga was being tested to see if it could treat patients hospitalised with Covid-19 who were at risk of complications and death.
The drugmaker said that Farxiga failed to achieve ‘statistical significance’ in preventing patients from declining.
“While the trial did not achieve statistical significance, the findings are very interesting and valuable, and will inform future clinical science,” principal investigator of the study, Mikhail Kosiborod, said.
The diabetes drug was given over 30 days to 1,250 patients hospitalised with Covid-19 globally.
The study comes as AstraZeneca and Oxford’s famed Covid-19 vaccine has been tied to rare blood clots by European and British regulators.
The blood clots have impacted 30 out of 18m vaccinated people in the UK so far, but the findings have shattered confidence in the drugmaker’s vaccine across Europe.
Despite this, the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency, has said that the benefits of having the AstraZeneca vaccine outweigh the risks.
AstraZeneca has been working to repurpose some of its existing drugs and treatments to treat Covid-19 infections.