Updates on How AI Being Employed to Speed COVID-19 Treatments and Management - AI Trends

Medical researchers are employing AI to search through databases of known drugs to see if any can be associated with a treatment for the new COVID-19 coronavirus. An early success story comes from BenevolentAI of London, which using tools developed to search through medical literature, identified rheumatoid arthritis drug baricitinib as a possible treatment for COVID-19. In a pilot study at the end of March, 12 adults with moderate COVID-19 admitted to the hospital in either Alessandria or Prato, Italy, received a daily dose of baricitinib, along with an anti-HIV drug combination of lopinavir and ritonavir, for two weeks. Another study group of 12 received just lopinavir and ritonavir. After their two-week treatment, the patients who received baricitinib had mostly recovered, according to a recent account in The Scientist.