An ounce of prevention and a pound of cure: Randomized clinical trials of therapeutics against COVID-19 and an assessment of personal protective equipment and distancing

Abstract

Given the multitudinous clinical characteristics of SARSCoV-2 infection (the cause of the COVID-19 pandemic), the medical profession’s early response to managing afflicted patients effectively amounted to throwing everything against the wall and hoping something would stick. Clinical trials were seemingly written and initiated overnight, but in the absence of evidence of a successful therapy, clinicians were trying anything. Yet despite the mayhem and challenges in emergently developing randomized clinical trials, several groups successfully completed high-quality studies that have defined evidencebased treatment options for moderately to severely ill patients with SARS-CoV-2. This review discusses the core of what has been learned to date from this initial frenzy of investigations.