After 35 days on a ventilator battling COVID-19, Karen Parker-Bryant is resting comfortably at home. Parker-Bryant was admitted to Clovis Community Medical Center on April 2. She missed her 64th birthday on April 16th because she was in a battle for her life. As her condition got worse, hope arrived in...
UCSF Fresno Doctor: ‘Remdesivir Should Be Given to Anyone’ to Fight COVID
"In a perfect world, remdesivir should be given to anyone," says Dr. Eyad Almasri of UCSF Fresno. Dr. Almasri made the comments during a teleconference with reporters and the Fresno County Department of Public Health last week when discussing treatment options for COVID patients. Remdesivir, a novel antiviral drug, was originally...
FDA Allows Emergency Use of Remdesivir for Coronavirus
WASHINGTON — U.S. regulators on Friday allowed emergency use of an experimental drug that appears to help some coronavirus patients recover faster. It is the first drug shown to help fight COVID-19, which has killed more than 230,000 people worldwide. The FDA said in a statement that Gilead Science’s intravenous...
Fauci Calls Experimental COVID-19 Drug Treatment ‘Standard of Care’ After Promising Results
Scientists on Wednesday announced the first effective treatment against the coronavirus — an experimental drug that can speed the recovery of COVID-19 patients — in a major medical advance that came as the economic gloom caused by the scourge deepened in the U.S. and Europe. The U.S. government said it...
Company Says Drug Proved Effective Against Virus in US Study
A biotech company says its experimental drug has proved effective against the new coronavirus in a major U.S. government study that put it to a strict test. Gilead Sciences’s remdesivir would be the first treatment to pass such a test against the virus, which has killed more than 218,000 people...
UCSF-Fresno Doctor Uses 'Promising' Drug on Covid-19 Patients
It's a four-syllable drug we may need to all learn by next month: "remdesivir." GV Wire spoke with the UCSF-Fresno doctor leading a local study on the drug. Dr. Eyad Almasri says he's already given the drug to four patients, and the hospital has only had it in stock for a...
NorCal Doctor: Not Everyone Needs COVID-19 Testing
"We almost don't need them for everybody," Dr. Roberta Luskin-Hawk says of COVID-19 tests. Her reasoning is explained below, but it also comes from a wealth of medical experience. She is an infectious disease specialist who worked with Dr. Anthony Fauci in Chicago during the AIDS epidemic. And she is the...
Coronavirus Patients Rush to Join Studies of Gilead Drug
The new coronavirus made Dr. Jag Singh a patient at his own hospital. His alarm grew as he saw an X-ray of his pneumonia-choked lungs and colleagues asked his wishes about life support while wheeling him into Massachusetts General’s intensive care unit. When they offered him a chance to help...
UC Davis Uses Antiviral Drug Remdesivir on 'Very Grave' COVID-19 Patient. She's Home Now.
UC Davis Medical Center received the first case of community transmission of COVID-19 in the U.S. on Feb. 26. Within 24 hours of admission, the female patient's respiratory status deteriorated. Because of the severity of her illness, the team received approval from the Food and Drug Administration to treat the woman...