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A combination of three antivirals — Kaletra (which is lopinavir plus ritonavir) and ribavirin — when given early and with interferon significantly reduces viral shedding, disease symptoms, and hospital stay in  patients with COVID-19 when compared with a control regimen of Kaletra alone. The drugs are active against other coronaviruses, but the key factors seem to be interferon and promptness of treatment. When the triple-drug combo was administered without interferon 7 days or more after the onset of symptoms, the results were no better than with Kaletra alone. Prof. Ivan Hung, the lead author on the report, explains that the researchers were afraid of prompting a cytokine “storm” if interferon was given after 6 days of symptoms — they’re not sure that that reluctance was well founded now. In any case, no patients died in either group. The study was conducted in Hong Kong and has just been published in The Lancet. (An earlier study by another group published in the New England Journal of Medicine found no sp