Multicenter Randomized Trial of Additional Treatments for COVID-19 in Hospitalized Patients

As one of the participating countries, the Philippines, led by Dr. Marissa Alejandria of UP-NIH conducts a study among 25 hospitals from Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. The study tests the safety and effectiveness of four repurposed drugs in treating COVID-19 compared to the standard of care being practiced in all participating hospitals. To compare the effects of major COVID-19 treatment outcomes among hospitals globally, the World Health Organization (WHO) organized a solidarity treatment trial aimed at unifying efforts to assess any effects and provide reliable estimates of these treatments on COVID-19 cases. The trial implements five treatment regimens namely: • Local standard of care (LSC)alone • LSC plus remdesivir • LSC plus chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine • LSC plus lopinavir with ritonavir • LSC plus lopinavir with ritonavir plus interferon As of December 2020, all 25 Single Joint Research Ethics Board or SJREB-approved participating hospitals have recruited a total of 1246 subjects to join the megatrial. The project is expected to provide evidencebased clinical practice guidelines for the care of COVID-19 patients and, eventually, provide evidence-based medicine against the virus.