Taking antiviral therapy Baxlovid It can reduce a person’s chances of getting seriously ill from COVID-19. But while older adults tend to get great acne protection, younger adults reap little of the benefit, according to new research.
in study Posted on August 24 in New England Journal of MedicineIn this article, researchers in Israel provide valuable real-world data on how effective the pills are against Omicron. The researchers studied data on 109,000 patients at a large healthcare facility — nearly all of whom had been vaccinated, previously infected, or both — and tracked their hospitalization and death rates by age. Nearly 4,000 people in the study, which took place from January to March 2022, took baxiloid.
People 65 and older had a 73% lower chance of being hospitalized with COVID-19 and a 79% lower chance of dying from the disease, compared to people in the same age group who did not take paxlovid. But people between the ages of 40 and 64 saw no statistically significant reduction in the risk of hospitalization or death.
Based on the results, the authors concluded that “no evidence of benefit was found in younger adults.”
To qualify for Paxlovid, patients must be at increased risk of developing serious illness from COVID-19. Risk factors include advanced age, as well as conditions such as obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, and a history of heart disease and kidney failure. But Israeli data suggests that age may be a more important consideration in evaluating who should take it.
While the benefits are clear for seniors, the findings raise questions about whether taking the drug is worth it for people under 65. It comes with potential side effects, including diarrhea, muscle pain, increased blood pressure, and a very bad aftertaste that can temporarily affect some people’s ability to eat. Baxlovid also interacts with common medications, such as cholesterol-lowering statins, so some doctors advise patients to stop or reduce these medications during the five-day course of Baxlovid. There are increasing reports that people who take baxlovid are more likely to experience A infection recoveryOr a re-emergence of the virus after they stop taking the pills.
One caveat with the study is that the researchers did not compartmentalize the data for younger people with cancer and other severe immunocompromised states, who may be more likely than other young adults to benefit from baxlovid — possibly to a greater degree than the data have shown. The more people who take the drugs, the doctors will have a better understanding of who will benefit the most, and for whom the benefits outweigh the risks.
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