Coronavirus Drug Helps Cruise Ship Patients In Japan

Shares of GILD stock popped Friday on reportedly promising results for its experimental coronavirus treatment in 14 Americans hospitalized in Japan. The results are some of the earliest for Gilead Sciences' (GILD) remdesivir, an antiviral that was previously under testing for Ebola virus. Now, the biotech company is hoping to use it to treat Covid-19, a form of coronavirus discovered in December in China. According to the Wall Street Journal, 14 Americans aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship who contracted Covid-19 were given remdesivir intravenously once a day for 10 days. As of Friday, all 14 were still alive and more than half had recovered. Five remain critically ill, Rear Adm. Richard Childs, an assistant surgeon general and lung specialist at the National Institutes of Health, reportedly said. The average age of the 14 patients is 75 and all of them were critically ill. "Many of them were probably going to die in a short amount of time, and two weeks later nobody has died and more than half of them have recovered," he said. "It's just absolutely amazing. It's going to take us a while to figure out what the impact of the drug has been." Many are pinning their hopes for Covid-19 treatment on remdesivir. Tests of the potential coronavirus treatment are ongoing in China, Japan and the U.S...MORE