Dr. Le Quang Huan (right) and his colleagues during preclinical research on the Vipdervir drug.

The Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology has announced the results of preclinical research on a Covid-19 treatment drug called Vipdervir, which is made entirely from Vietnamese herbs. The project is chaired by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Le Quang Huan, a senior researcher at the Institute of Biotechnology under the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology.

The National Ethics Council for Biomedical Research, Ministry of Health has praised the results of preclinical studies and approved the clinical trial of Vipdervir on Covid-19 patients.

The Ministry of Health will coordinate with the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology to direct relevant agencies to conduct clinical trials on 260 Covid-19 patients. If the clinical trial results are safe and effective, the Administration of Traditional Medicine and Pharmacy will consider licensing the drug.

Dr. Nguyen Ngo Quang, Deputy Director of the Department of Science and Technology Training, Ministry of Health says that the advantage of the clinical trial process is that the number of Covid-19 patients, especially those with mild and moderate symptoms, is very large, so the recruitment of volunteers to participate in the study is convenient. Secondly, Vipdervir is completely made of herbs, which is a traditional medicine product, so many people want to use it.

The clinical research period is scheduled to be about 2-3 months, and then an additional 1-2 months are needed for scientists to summarize the research.

"We hope this product will be licenced by the end of this year," said Dr. Nguyen Ngo Quang.

The results of preclinical studies show that Vipdervir is safe and effective in inhibiting the growth of SARS-CoV-2 virus, enhancing immunity in experimental models.

According to Dr. Le Quang Huan, the research team used bioinformatics technology to screen the main active ingredients in herbs with strong binding affinity to molecules involved in the invasion and proliferation of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. They also combined ancient and modern medical documents and recent international publications to create a product with the highest treatment efficiency.

On that basis, Vipdervir can prevent the adhesion of the virus to the host cell, and inhibits viral replication while activating immune cells so that they recognize, block and eliminate viral particles. These mechanisms have a synergistic effect to help prevent and treat Covid-19.

In a preclinical study on rabbits, after giving rabbits an oral suspension with two doses of 0.378 tablets/kg rabbit/day for 28 consecutive days (equivalent to the maximum dose for a human of 6 tablets/person/day) and 1.133 tablets/kg of rabbit/day (3 times higher than the maximum dose for a human), the test sample did not affect the weight, body condition and movement of the rabbits.

The rabbits were healthy with no difference in their weight before, between and after the test.

Vipdervir has been evaluated for toxicity at the Pharmacology Faculty of the Hanoi Medical University and the Central Institute for Drug Testing. It was evaluated for the ability to inhibit H5N1 virus at the Institute of Biotechnology, and evaluated for the ability to inhibit SARS-CoV-2 virus at the Central Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology.

Nguyen Lien

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