Employing drug delivery strategies to create safe and effective pharmaceuticals for COVID‐19

摘要

The outbreak of the novel SARS-CoV-2 pathogen and correspondingcoronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have had an enormous impacton both global health and the daily lives of billions of people world-wide. With a proven vaccine at least a year from being fully tested forsafety and efficacy, there may be an opportunity to rapidly repurposeexisting drugs in order to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infections and improveoutcomes for patients already infected with COVID-19. At present,more than 40 different drugs are being explored for efficacy againstCOVID-19, including antivirals and immune modulating compounds.Unfortunately, many of these drugs are associated with side effectsthat limit their use to the most severe cases and thereby prevent theiruse as prophylactics. This commentary describes drug formulationstrategies that can be used to maintain the efficacy of these drugsthrough controlled release, targeted delivery, and nonviral nucleic aciddelivery. If successful, these approaches could enable the expandeduse of drugs to reduce the mortality of this devastating disease andequip healthcare providers with the tools to accelerate our recoveryfrom this pandemic and improve our response to the next outbreak ofa novel pathogenic virus.