摘要：Worldwide, there are intensive eforts to identify repurposed drugs as potential therapies against SARS-CoV-2 infection and the associated COVID-19 disease . To date, the anti-infammatory drug dexamethasone and (to a lesser extent) the RNA-polymerase inhibitor remdesivir have been shown to be efective in reducing mortality and patient time to recovery, respectively, in patients . Here, we report the results of a phenotypic screening campaign within an EU-funded project (H2020-EXSCALATE4COV) aimed at extending the repertoire of anti-COVID therapeutics through repurposing of available compounds and highlighting compounds with new mechanisms of action against viral infection . We screened 8702 molecules from diferent repurposing libraries, to reveal 110 compounds with an anti- cytopathic IC50 < 20 µM . From this group, 18 with a safety index greater than 2 are also marketed drugs, making them suitable for further study as potential therapies against COVID-19 . Our result supports the idea that a systematic approach to repurposing is a valid strategy to accelerate the necessary drug discovery process .
