Daily Regimen of Tenofovir/Emtricitabine as Prevention for COVID-19 in Health Care Personnel in Colombia

Effectiveness of the use of Tenofovir/Emtricitabine in addition to personal protective equipment for the prevention of the transmission of SARS-COV-2 to health care personnel. A Randomized Clinical Trial. This is an experimental study whose aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of a drug to prevent infection with the virus that causes COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2), in health care workers. The drug under study is Tenofovir /Emtricitabine, a well-known antiretroviral, which is safe and is used as prophylaxis and treatment for HIV and other viral infections such as Hepatitis. Several laboratory-based studies indicate that this drug has the potential to inhibit SARS-CoV-2 replication. In addition, one study in HIV infected persons found that those taking Tenofovir /Emtricitabine tended to have a lower occurrence of COVID-19. In this study, we will compare the occurrence of infection with SARS-CoV-2/ COVID19 in health care workers between those assigned to an intervention group and those assigned to a control group. The intervention group will receive Tenofovir /Emtricitabine during 60 days in addition to the use of personal protective equipment (PPE), and the control group will receive a placebo during 60 days in addition to the use of personal protective equipment (PPE). The study will recruit 950 health professionals above 18 and less than 70 years, working in the emergency room, COVID wards and intensive care units of seven hospitals in Colombia. To make the comparison groups very similar, the participants will be assigned through a random mechanism to either the intervention (475), or the control (475) groups. In order to prevent biases in the evaluation of the results, neither the participants nor the clinical investigators, data managers, analysts and support personnel will know which intervention the participants are receiving. To determine the occurrence of infection with the virus the study will use both molecular tests that detect the presence of viral genes in