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. 2022 May 27:13:33-41.
doi: 10.2147/POR.S364066. eCollection 2022.

Real-World Experience with Favipiravir for the Treatment of Mild-to-Moderate COVID-19 in India

Shashank Joshi  1 , Agam Vora  2 , K Venugopal  3 , Pramod Dadhich  4 , Anil Daxini  5 , Sagar Bhagat  6 , Saiprasad Patil  6 , Hanmant Barkate  6
Affiliations

Real-World Experience with Favipiravir for the Treatment of Mild-to-Moderate COVID-19 in India

Shashank Joshi et al. Pragmat Obs Res. .

Abstract

Background: Favipiravir, an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase inhibitor (RdRp), is a broad-spectrum oral antiviral agent approved in India under emergency use authorization, for the treatment of mild-to-moderate coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The present study was planned to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of favipiravir in real-world clinical practice.

Materials and methods: This was a multicentric, retrospective, single-arm study conducted across four centres in India, after obtaining permission from the independent ethics committee. Medical records were analysed to evaluate effectiveness and safety of patients who were prescribed favipiravir.

Results: The medical records of a total of 360 patients met the inclusion criteria, with 358 of them available for the final analysis. Males made up 58.46% of the study population. The average age of enrolled patients was 51.80 ± 16.45 years. The most common symptoms were fever, cough, and myalgia-fatigue. The median time to clinical cure and fever relief was five and four days, respectively. The average length of stay in the hospital was six days. In total, 8% of the patients experienced adverse events. Hepatic enzyme elevation, diarrhoea, decreased appetite, headache, fatigue, and giddiness were the common symptoms.

Conclusion: In our real-world study, favipiravir was found to have a clinical cure rate of more than 90% in mild-to-moderate COVID-19 patients. This supports the use of favipiravir in the treatment of COVID-19. Favipiravir was well tolerated, with only minimal side effects, which were transient in nature.

Keywords: COVID-19; India; antiviral; favipiravir.

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Conflict of interest statement

Dr. Sagar Bhagat, Dr. Saiprasad Patil and Dr. Hanmant Barkate are employees of Glenmark Pharmaceutical and had helped in the data analysis and manuscript writing. Dr Shashank Joshi reports speaker fees from Glenmark, during the conduct of the study; advisor, speaker fees consultancy from Glenmark, Novo, Twin Health, Marico, PHFI, Astra Zeneca, Roche Diabetes Care, Abbott, Biocon, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi, Torrent, Zydus Cadila, Bayer Zydus, MSD, Boehringer Ingelheim, Franco India, Alkem, Cipla, outside the submitted work. The authors report no other conflicts of interest in this work.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Proportion of patients achieving clinical cure with favipiravir at specified duration. Clinical cure achieved among enrolled patients, data presented as proportion of patients achieving clinical cure at various interval of favipiravir treatment.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Proportion of patients achieving resolution of pyrexia with favipiravir at specified duration. Resolution of pyrexia among enrolled patients, data presented as proportion of patients who achieved pyrexia resolution at various interval of favipiravir treatment.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Proportion of patients requiring respiratory support at different time points during study period. Requirement of oxygen among enrolled patients, data presented as proportion of patients requiring oxygen support at various interval of favipiravir treatment.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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