London, Oct 29: Researchers have identified a potential new drug treatment that suppresses the reproduction of SARS-CoV-2 virus, that causes COVID-19, in infected cells.

To multiply, all viruses infect cells and reprogramme them to produce novel viruses, the researchers said.

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The study, published recently in the journal Metabolites, shows that cells infected with SARS-CoV-2 can only produce novel coronaviruses when a metabolic pathway called pentose phosphate pathway is activated. COVID-19 Treatment Update: Researchers Identify Potential New Way of Treating Coronavirus.

The researchers from the University of Kent in the UK and Goethe-University in Germany found that the drug benfooxythiamine, an inhibitor of this metabolic pathway, suppressed reproduction of SARS-CoV-2, and infected cells did not produce coronaviruses.

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"This is a breakthrough in the research of COVID-19 treatment," said Professor Martin Michaelis from the University of Kent.

"Since resistance development is a big problem in the treatment of viral diseases, having therapies that use different targets is very important and provides further hope for developing the most effective treatments for COVID-19," Michaelis said.

The researchers found that benfooxythiamine also increased the antiviral activity of '2-deoxy-D-glucose', another drug which modifies the host cell's metabolism to reduce virus multiplication.

This shows that pentose phosphate pathway inhibitors like benfooxythiamine are a potential new treatment option for COVID-19, both on their own and in combination with other treatments, they said.

The researchers noted that the drug's antiviral mechanism differs from that of other potential COVID-19 drugs such as remdesivir and molnupiravir.

They noted that viruses resistant to these drugs may, therefore, be sensitive to benfooxythiamin.

"Targeting virus-induced changes in the host cell metabolism is an attractive way to interfere specifically with the virus replication process," Professor Jindrich Cinatl from Goethe-University added.

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