Alleviation Before Cure
“Alleviation Before Cure” was originally published at City Journal.
No proven pharmaceutical agents specific to the treatment or prevention of Covid-19 currently exist. For now, we must rely on nonpharmaceutical interventions—social distancing, hygiene, and closings of schools and businesses—to mitigate the spread of the virus. For severely ill patients, the best we can do at the moment is supportive care, from intravenous fluids, oxygen, and ventilators to dialysis and blood-pressure-support medicine.
As the United States begins to scale back on the most extreme mitigation measures, public-health officials will turn their efforts toward contact tracing. But we still need therapies that can cure early infection and prevent the worsening of asymptomatic or mild disease, and medications that can prevent individuals from becoming infected before (or right after) they are exposed. These pharmaceutical interventions will enhance our “test-and-treat” containment strategy.
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