Sales of unproven Covid treatment soar in Poland’s least-vaccinated region

Sales of amantadine, an unproven COVID-19 treatment, have soared in Poland, and are expected to this year reach quadruple the level of before the pandemic. The drug has been promoted by some doctors, and even a deputy minister in the government, as an effective tool to treat Covid infections.

The higher number of sales are taking place in the southeastern Podkarpackie province, which also has Poland’s lowest Covid vaccination rates. Experts have expressed concern that people are using self-treatment instead of tested approaches.

Amantadine is a medicine used in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis. Despite suggestions that the drug could also be effective against COVID-19, it has not been officially recommended by any country.

Yet sales have soared in Poland. In 2019, before the pandemic, 118,000 packages were sold across the country. This number began to climb in October last year, reaching a record of 100,230 packages sold in April this year, at the peak of the third wave.

Over 400,000 packages have already been sold this year, according to data by PEX PharmaSequence, a pharmaceutical market research company, published by Gazeta Wyborcza.

The highest sales were recorded in the Podkarpackie province in the southeastern tip of Poland, notes the newspaper. In that province, only 38% of residents are fully vaccinated, the lowest of any of Poland’s 16 provinces.

Between the start of the pandemic in March 2020 and October this year, around 3,696 packages of amantadine were sold per 100,000 inhabitants in Podkarpackie. By contrast, the figure in the central Łódź province was just 366.

The only other region with a figure close to Podkarpackie is the western Lubuskie province, where 3,174 packages have been sold per 100,000 people.

Gazeta Wyborcza reports that many prescriptions for amantadine are sold online, with few questions asked. In one case, a prescription was obtained from a vet, notes the deputy president of the Supreme Pharmaceutical Chamber, Marek Tomków.

Amantadine is not mentioned in recommendations for Covid treatment by any scientific society in the world, says Robert Flisiak, head of Poland’s Society of Epidemiologists and Doctors of Infectious Diseases.

Two final clinical trials on the medicine, which have been financed by Poland’s state Medical Research Agency, are currently scheduled for spring next year.

However, the treatment has some vocal advocates in the medical community, including Włodzimierz Bodnar, a doctor from Przemyśl (a city in Podkarpackie), and Konrad Rejdak, a neurologist from the Medical University of Lublin, reports Gazeta Wyborcza.

The drug has also been promoted by politicians from the ruling camp. Marcin Warchoł, a deputy justice minister, tweeted last year that “Amantadine works on COVID! I am an example”. He said he would “demand” that the health ministry takes note of the medicine.

Main image credit: Marco Verch Professional Photographer/Flickr (under CC BY 2.0)

Maria Wilczek

Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She is a regular writer for The Times, The Economist and Al Jazeera English, and has also featured in Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.