Cuba Works on New Product to Fight “Cytokine Storm” Produced by COVID-19

The Center of Molecular Immunology (CIM by its Spanish acronym) is working to obtain an antagonist of interleukin-6, a product that can be used to inhibit the so-called “cytokine storm”, an uncontrolled reaction of the immune system that aggravates the response of patients with COVID-19.

As explained exclusively to the Cuban News Agency, Tania Carmenate Portilla, head of the department of Immunoregulation of the CIM, the project is in its initial phase.

Nowadays, when treatment protocols are still not accurate, several countries have used antibodies against interleukin-6, with specific results so far.

She also pointed out that the department she heads designed the drug, at the beginning, to treat chronic inflammations associated to cancer diseases, one of the main lines of research and production of the biotechnology
institution.

Like other laboratories of the CIM, the Immunoregulation Laboratory, which belongs to the Research Department, develops products used in the treatment of noncommunicable autoimmune diseases.

Three of the drugs that make up the Cuban protocol for the treatment of COVID-19 are developed by the Center for Molecular Immunology: the monoclonal antibody Itolizumab, created to combat leukemias and lymphomas; the recombinant human erythropoietin, of proven efficacy in people with renal failure and, finally, the stem cell generating factor LeukoCIM.