The discovery in Britain that a £5 steroid, dexamethasone, can be effective in treating Covid marks a potential breakthrough in our understanding of the virus. Much remains to be learned about the wider potential of the drug but the claims made about its success are striking: that it reduces deaths by a third in patients on ventilators and by a fifth in patients receiving oxygen only. It has not been shown to benefit Covid patients who do not require oxygen. But this can still, in a global pandemic, mean thousands of lives saved.
There are two further points to be made. With Covid-19, there is a better chance of finding a treatment for the virus than of finding a vaccine. Second, the gathering and interrogation of this data can be of huge use in finding out what works and what does not.
The UK study looked at the role of old familiar generic drugs. Pharmaceutical companies understandably focus on developing new products: that is their raison d’être. There is no real money to be made in the discovery about the role of steroids.
It is puzzling that the government is proceeding so gingerly when it comes to relaxing the lockdown
It is understandable that Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, has been so keen to tell the world about dexamethasone. Some 4,000 Covid patients are dying each day across the world, and if even a small fraction of those lives can be saved with a widely available drug then every day counts.
But another mass experiment is going on, which is also worthy of the British government’s attention. In schools, too, every day counts. Lockdown is being eased all over the world, without much sign of the ‘second wave’ that so many feared.
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