An In Silico study supports the efficacy of bromhexine [Sgrignani].

2 In Vitro studies support the efficacy of bromhexine [Carpinteiro, Hoffman].

Preclinical research is an important part of the development of treatments, however results may be very different in clinical trials. Preclinical results are not used in this paper.

Figure 3 shows a visual overview of the results, with details in Table 1 and Table 2. Figure 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 show forest plots for a random effects meta-analysis of all studies with pooled effects, mortality results, ventilation, ICU admission, hospitalization, recovery, cases, viral clearance, and peer reviewed studies.

Heterogeneity in COVID-19 studies arises from many factors including:

Treatment delay.

The time between infection or the onset of symptoms and treatment may critically affect how well a treatment works. For example an antiviral may be very effective when used early but may not be effective in late stage disease, and may even be harmful. Oseltamivir, for example, is generally only considered effective for influenza when used within 0-36 or 0-48 hours [McLean, Treanor]. Figure 16 shows a mixed-effects meta-regression for efficacy as a function of treatment delay in COVID-19 studies from 42 treatments, showing that efficacy declines rapidly with treatment delay. Early treatment is critical for COVID-19.

Patient demographics.

Details of the patient population including age and comorbidities may critically affect how well a treatment works. For example, many COVID-19 studies with relatively young low-comorbidity patients show all patients recovering quickly with or without treatment. In such cases, there is little room for an effective treatment to improve results (as in [López-Medina]).

Effect measured.

Efficacy may differ significantly depending on the effect measured, for example a treatment may be very effective at reducing mortality, but less effective at minimizing cases or hospitalization. Or a treatment may have no effect on viral clearance while still being effective at reducing mortality.

Variants.

There are many different variants of SARS-CoV-2 and efficacy may depend critically on the distribution of variants encountered by the patients in a study. For example, the Gamma variant shows significantly different characteristics [Faria, Karita, Nonaka, Zavascki]. Different mechanisms of action may be more or less effective depending on variants, for example the viral entry process for the omicron variant has moved towards TMPRSS2-independent fusion, suggesting that TMPRSS2 inhibitors may be less effective [Peacock, Willett].

Regimen.

Effectiveness may depend strongly on the dosage and treatment regimen.

Treatments.

The use of other treatments may significantly affect outcomes, including anything from supplements, other medications, or other kinds of treatment such as prone positioning.

The distribution of studies will alter the outcome of a meta analysis. Consider a simplified example where everything is equal except for the treatment delay, and effectiveness decreases to zero or below with increasing delay. If there are many studies using very late treatment, the outcome may be negative, even though the treatment may be very effective when used earlier.

In general, by combining heterogeneous studies, as all meta analyses do, we run the risk of obscuring an effect by including studies where the treatment is less effective, not effective, or harmful.

When including studies where a treatment is less effective we expect the estimated effect size to be lower than that for the optimal case. We do not a priori expect that pooling all studies will create a positive result for an effective treatment. Looking at all studies is valuable for providing an overview of all research, important to avoid cherry-picking, and informative when a positive result is found despite combining less-optimal situations. However, the resulting estimate does not apply to specific cases such as early treatment in high-risk populations.

Publication bias.

Publishing is often biased towards positive results, however evidence suggests that there may be a negative bias for inexpensive treatments for COVID-19. Both negative and positive results are very important for COVID-19, media in many countries prioritizes negative results for inexpensive treatments (inverting the typical incentive for scientists that value media recognition), and there are many reports of difficulty publishing positive results [Boulware, Meeus, Meneguesso]. For bromhexine, there is currently not enough data to evaluate publication bias with high confidence.

Funnel plot analysis.

Funnel plots have traditionally been used for analyzing publication bias. This is invalid for COVID-19 acute treatment trials — the underlying assumptions are invalid, which we can demonstrate with a simple example. Consider a set of hypothetical perfect trials with no bias. Figure 17 plot A shows a funnel plot for a simulation of 80 perfect trials, with random group sizes, and each patient's outcome randomly sampled (10% control event probability, and a 30% effect size for treatment). Analysis shows no asymmetry (p > 0.05). In plot B, we add a single typical variation in COVID-19 treatment trials — treatment delay. Consider that efficacy varies from 90% for treatment within 24 hours, reducing to 10% when treatment is delayed 3 days. In plot B, each trial's treatment delay is randomly selected. Analysis now shows highly significant asymmetry, p < 0.0001, with six variants of Egger's test all showing p < 0.05 [Egger, Harbord, Macaskill, Moreno, Peters, Rothstein, Rücker, Stanley]. Note that these tests fail even though treatment delay is uniformly distributed. In reality treatment delay is more complex — each trial has a different distribution of delays across patients, and the distribution across trials may be biased (e.g., late treatment trials may be more common). Similarly, many other variations in trials may produce asymmetry, including dose, administration, duration of treatment, differences in SOC, comorbidities, age, variants, and bias in design, implementation, analysis, and reporting.

Conflicts of interest.

Pharmaceutical drug trials often have conflicts of interest whereby sponsors or trial staff have a financial interest in the outcome being positive. Bromhexine for COVID-19 lacks this because it is off-patent, has multiple manufacturers, and is very low cost. In contrast, most COVID-19 bromhexine trials have been run by physicians on the front lines with the primary goal of finding the best methods to save human lives and minimize the collateral damage caused by COVID-19. While pharmaceutical companies are careful to run trials under optimal conditions (for example, restricting patients to those most likely to benefit, only including patients that can be treated soon after onset when necessary, and ensuring accurate dosing), not all bromhexine trials represent the optimal conditions for efficacy.

Early/late vs. mild/moderate/severe.

Some analyses classify treatment based on early/late administration (as we do here), while others distinguish between mild/moderate/severe cases. We note that viral load does not indicate degree of symptoms — for example patients may have a high viral load while being asymptomatic. With regard to treatments that have antiviral properties, timing of treatment is critical — late administration may be less helpful regardless of severity.

Notes.

1 of 6 studies combine treatments. The results of bromhexine alone may differ. 1 of 6 RCTs use combined treatment.

Statistically significant improvements are seen for ventilation, ICU admission, and viral clearance. 4 studies from 4 independent teams in 3 different countries show statistically significant improvements in isolation (1 for the most serious outcome). Meta analysis using the most serious outcome reported shows 50% [-8‑77%] improvement, without reaching statistical significance. Results are similar for peer-reviewed studies. Early treatment is more effective than late treatment. Currently all studies are RCTs.

Currently there is limited data, with only 684 patients and only 12 control events for the most serious outcome in trials to date.

Bromhexine may be less effective for omicron due to the entry process moving towards TMPRSS2-independent fusion [Peacock, Willett].

Ansarin

[Ansarin] RCT with 39 bromhexine and 39 control patients showing lower mortality, intubation, and ICU admission with treatment. The treatment group received bromhexine hydrochloride 8 mg three times a day for two weeks. All patients received SOC including HCQ.

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Li

[Li] Tiny RCT with 12 bromhexine and 6 control patients showing non-statistically significant improvements in chest CT, need for oxygen therapy, and discharge rate within 20 days. Authors recommend a larger scale trial.

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Mareev

[Mareev] Prospective 103 PCR+ patients in Russia, 33 treated with bromexhine+spironolactone, showing lower PCR+ at day 10 or hospitalization >10 days with treatment. Bromhexine 8mg 4 times daily, spironolactone 25-50 mg/day for 10 days.

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Mikhaylov