NEW DELHI: The World Health Organisation on Tuesday warned against the general use of 'ivermectin' — an orally-administered drug used to treat parasitic infections — for treatment of COVID-19 patients.
'Safety and efficacy are important when using any drug for a new indication. @WHO recommends against the use of ivermectin for COVID-19 except within clinical trials,' Soumya Swaminathan, the global health body's chief scientist, said in a tweet.
In her tweet, Swaminathan also attached a warning issued by the German health care and life sciences giant Merck. 'Scientists continue to carefully examine the findings of all available and emerging studies of ivermectin for the treatment of COVID-19,' read the statement from Merck.
'...to-date, our analysis has identified: No scientific basis for a potential therapeutic effect against COVID-19 from pre-clinical studies; No meaningful evidence for clinical activity or clinical efficacy in patients with COVID-19 disease, and a concerning lack of safety data in the majority of studies,' the statement added.
The WHO had, in March, issued a similar warning against the use of ivermectin in treating Covid patients.
The global health agency said that there was a 'very low certainty of evidence' on ivermectin's effects on mortality, hospital admission and getting rid of the virus from the body.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had also, in April last year, recommended against the use of ivermectin in treating Covid patients. Besides, the Union ministry of health and family welfare had also reportedly opted out from including Ivermectin in its official Clinical Management Protocol for COVID-19 last year.