New Delhi: The Defence Research and Development Organisation anti-COVID-19 drug 2-DG is effective against all variants of COVID-19 also the drug reduces coronavirus multiplication, a new study claimed.
The drug has been developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Dr Reddy`s laboratories. The study was conducted by Annat Narayan Bhatt, Abhishek Kumar, Yogesh Rai, Dhiviya Vedagiri and others though, it has not yet been peer-reviewed, ANI reported.
"In this study, we used 2-Deoxy-D-glucose (2-DG) to target and inhibit the metabolic reprogramming induced by SARS-CoV-2 infection. Our results showed that virus infection induces glucose influx and glycolysis resulting in selective high accumulation of the fluorescent glucose/2-DG analogue, 2-NBDG in these cells. Subsequently, 2-DG reduces the virus multiplication and alleviates the cells from infection-induced cytopathic effect (CPE) and cell death," the study read.
On June 1, the DRDO had said that the anti-COVID drug 2-DG was approved for emergency use as an adjunct therapy to the standard of care in the treatment of coronavirus patients in hospital settings.
