Paxlovid doesn’t appear to help people with Long COVID Patients prescribed 15 days of Paxlovid had no significant improvement in their symptoms compared to people on a placebo Results did show it is safe to take Paxlovid longer than the five days currently recommended FRIDAY, June 7, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- An extended course of the antiviral drug Paxlovid won’t ease a person’s Long COVID symptoms, a new study finds. People who took Paxlovid for 15 days -- three times as long as it’s prescribed for an initial infection -- had no better improvement in their Long COVID than people taking a placebo, researchers reported June 7 in the journal . “While there are now improved therapies and treatment practices for acute COVID, there’s nothing FDA-approved for Long COVID,” said senior researcher , chief of infectious disease and geographic medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine.
“People continue to suffer and the numbers keep piling up.” An estimated 10% to 20% of COVID patients -- tens of millions in the United States alone -- develop Long COVID, a collection of symptoms that tend to crop up three months or more after a person’s initial infection. One theory has held that Long COVID might occur due to leftover virus or viral debris that remains in a person’s deep tissues even after they’ve cleared the infection.
“Some studies suggest that viral particles and molecular debris could be responsible for some Long-COVID sufferers’ ongoing symp.