The story also mentions a MERS-CoV "treatment protocol" (without further clarification) involving antivirals similar to those used for Hepatitis C virus infections. I wonder if this March 2013 paper by Falzarano and colleagues in Nature could be the source of such a protocol? It involves use of interferon-a2b and ribavirin to inhibit HCoV-EMC (now the MERS-CoV) replication.
Independently, each drug was needed at relatively high concentrations in cell culture studies, but when combined, they seemed to synergize and could be used at lower concentrations.
It would be great to have more information on the Saudi Arabian treatment protocol but also to know if the Nature article's approach has been used successfully anywhere to date in treating severe acute respiratory infections (SARIs) testing positive for the MERS-CoV).
