Surfactant-based prophylaxis and therapy against COVID-19: A possibility
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Intratracheal Instillation of Stem Cells in Term Neonatal Rats
Published on: May 4, 2020
K Pramod1, Sabna Kotta2, U S Jijith1
1College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Govt. Medical College, Kozhikode, Kerala, India.
Abstract:
Hand hygiene by washing with soap and water is recommended for the prevention of COVID-19 spread. Soaps and detergents are explained to act by damaging viral spike glycoproteins (peplomers) or by washing out the virus through entrapment in the micelles. Technically, soaps come under a functional category of molecules known as surfactants. Surfactants are widely used in pharmaceutical formulations as excipients. We wonder why surfactants are still not tried for prophylaxis or therapy against COVID-19? That too when many of them have proven antiviral properties. Moreover, lung surfactants have already shown benefits in respiratory viral infections. Therefore, we postulate that surfactant-based prophylaxis and therapy would be promising. We believe that our hypothesis would stimulate debate or new research exploring the possibility of surfactant-based prophylaxis and therapy against COVID-19. The success of a surfactant-based technique would save the world from any such pandemic in the future too.
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