US approves remdesivir to help coronavirus-infected patients

A bottle containing the drug remdesivir is shown by a health worker (Zsolt Czegledi/AP)

The US Food and Drug Administration has approved the first drug to treat Covid-19, remdesivir, an antiviral medicine given through an IV for patients needing hospital admission

The drug, which California-based Gilead Sciences Inc is calling Veklury, cut the time to recovery by five days, from 15 days to 10 on average, in a large study led by the US National Institutes of Health.