Rheumatoid arthritis drug falls short as treatment for hospitalized Covid-19 patients in three studies - CNN

However, a fourth trial did find the drug increased the chances of survival, but because it was an observational study, the results are considered less definitive.

Three of the trials were published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association and the other was published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

While this leaves the picture for tocilizumab use a bit muddy, the studies taken together show the drug isn't a magic bullet that should be used in all hospitalized patients with Covid-19, but they leave the door open for possible use in specific patient groups.

"It is possible that forthcoming results from other randomized trials will help us identify specific groups of people who will benefit.

Jonathan Parr told CNN.

Parr, an assistant professor in the division of infectious diseases at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, wrote an editorial that was published alongside the three studies in JAMA.

Tocilizumab, sold under the brand name Actemra and used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, blocks interleukin-6, a molecule that produces inflammation.

Earlier in the pandemic, the drug became widely used in the United States after reports from China and Europe appeared to show it helped very ill patients who experienced a so-called cytokine storm by extinguishing the out-of-control inflammation that developed in response to the coronavirus.

Study results start coming in

However, those early reports were mostly observational, meaning they took existing data and analyzed it as opposed to designing a trial specifically to assess tocilizumab.

But now the results from trials designed to look at the drug prospectively are beginning to come in.

The first of the three JAMA studies found that hospitalized patients in Italy who were not yet in intensive care and who received tocilizumab fared no better than those who received standard care.

In contrast, the [other two trials] studied patients with much milder illness severity," said Dr.