Safety and efficacy of Paxlovid in the treatment of adults with mild to moderate COVID-19 during the omicron epidemic: a multicentre study from China

ABSTRACT

Background

Since December 2022, the Omicron variant has led to a widespread pandemic in China. The study was to explore the safety and effectiveness of Paxlovid for the treatment of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

Research design and methods

We included patients at risk of developing severe COVID-19, all of whom exhibited mild to moderate symptoms and were admitted to three hospital centers. Patients were divided into two groups: one received Paxlovid alongside standard care, while the other was given only standard care. We compared clinical characteristics, hospital stay duration, and clinical outcomes between two groups. Multi-factor analysis determined the independent risk factors influencing the duration of hospitalization and disease progression.

Results

In the study, those treated with Paxlovid shorter hospital stays than those in the control group (p < 0.001). Multivariate analysis indicated that the absence of Paxlovid treatment was a distinct risk factor for hospitalizations lasting over 7 days (OR: 4.983, 95% CI: 3.828–6.486, p < 0.001) and 14 days (OR: 2.940, 95% CI: 2.402–3.597, p < 0.001).

Conclusion

Amid the Omicron outbreak, Paxlovid has proven to be a safe and effective treatment for reducing hospitalization durations for patients with mild to moderate COVID-19.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• SARS-CoV-2
• Paxlovid
• hospitalization
• prognosis

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Ethics statement

This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University (Quick-PJ-2023-07-79), the Ethics Committee of Dushu Lake Hospital Affiliated to Soochow University (2023-Scientific Research-100) and the Ethics Committee of the Second People’s Hospital of Hefei (2023 Ethics Research-404). The study was retrospective and therefore exempted from informed consent.

Data availability statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article and supplement. Further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding authors.

Author contribution statement

Pulin Li and Ling Huang analyzed the data and wrote the first draft. Ran Wang, Daxiong Zeng and Guanghe Fei designed the study, proofread, and revised the submission. Rui Han and Min Tang directed the statistical analyses of the data. Pulin Li and extracted data. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the fund for Research Fund project of Anhui Medical University (2023xkj144), Young Jianghuai famous medical training project, and Excellent physician Training program of Anhui Medical University.