(Yicai Global) Feb. 3 -- Remdesivir, a drug developed by US-based Gilead Sciences, which shows promise in treating the new coronavirus, is undergoing clinical trials from today in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the hotspot of the flu-like pneumonia epidemic, Beijing-based China-Japan Friendship Hospital announced yesterday.

These bedside tests will end on April 27, and the hospital will skip second-phase clinical research and move to third-phase clinical trials of 270 samples from mild and moderate 2019-nCoV pneumonia patients, the hospital said.

China's National Medical Products Administration has green-lighted the application for the Remdesivir tests, its Center for Drug Evaluation said yesterday.

The US' first confirmed 2019-nCoV case was quickly alleviated following experimental therapy under Compassionate Use of the drug, per a paper appearing in the US The New England Journal of Medicine on Jan. 31.

 The pharmaceutical has to date not secured approval for marketing in any country, and its safety and effectiveness thus still await verification, Merdad Parsey, Gilead's chief medical officer, said in a statement on Feb. 1. The medicinal compound has, however, been confirmed as active against viral pathogens of the severe acute respiratory syndrome and Middle East respiratory syndrome in vitro and in animal models, and these two viruses are very similar to the 2019-nCov in structure, per the statement. 

The effective use of Remdesivir in treating patients will ensue on a case-by-cases basis, and the possibility of other remedies effecting a cure or self-recovery cannot be ruled out, so no evidence has yet come to light that the drug is yet suitable for mass application, Prof. Wang Liming from the Life Sciences Institute of Zhejiang University, noted in an article yesterday.

Gilead Sciences' shares [NASDAQ:GILD] fell 1.3 percent to USD63.20 on Jan. 31.

The first 2019-nCoV case emerged in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province in December. The city home to 11 million residents is a major transport hub straddling the Yangtze River and is thus ideal for spreading the pestilence, the more so as its outbreak coincided with China's Spring Festival travel peak, which is the world's largest annual human migration. The Chinese mainland confirmed 17,205 cases as of yesterday, health authorities said, adding 361 people had already died of the disease.

Editors: Dou Shicong, Ben Armour