Metformin significantly reduced SARS-CoV-2 viral load in outpatients: by 3.6-fold
This decrease may explain the observed clinical benefits in the COVID-OUT trial.
Details: metformin reduced the odds of hospitalizations/death through 28 days by 58%, of emergency department visits/hospitalizations/death through 14 days by 42%, and of long COVID through 10 months by 42%.
Possible mechanism:metformin targets the host’s mTOR pathway to suppress protein translation, potentially hindering virus replication.
I began taking metformin after noticing that my husband, who takes it for diabetes, never got sick or even tested positive for Covid during a 2-week period when I and another household member were sick with Covid, then found studies like this one. Metformin eliminated my chronic post-Covid inflammatory/vascular symptoms that happen between episodes of a recurrent viral myocarditis, first triggered by the vaccine. It doesn’t prevent the myocarditis episodes, but the other symptoms are gone (painful occipital headache, neck pain/inflammation in carotid arteries area, occasional pain in temples and eyes, malaise). I know it’s the metformin, because when I stopped taking it a few times due to gastro issues, the symptoms returned, then resolved again within about 3 weeks of restarting. I now take the ER version (with no gastro side effects) and will be indefinitely.
It clearly doesn’t prevent Covid since both my husband and I subsequently got sick with Covid while taking metformin. But it’s helping me in some way.
As an added benefit, it seems to have rejuvenated my metabolism and helped me lose weight, when it was extremely difficult to do so before.
