After A Year Battling COVID-19, Drug Treatments Get A Mixed Report Card

A nurse tends to a Covid-19 patient in the intensive care unit at Providence St. Mary Medical Center in Apple Valley, Calif., on Jan. 11.

Ariana Drehsler / AFP via Getty Images

Drugs to treat COVID-19 are being fast-tracked for development, but the pace can’t match the astonishing speed that gave birth to the vaccines.

But one year into the pandemic, there has been strong progress toward effective drug treatments, and the groundwork has been laid for drugs to kill the virus and arrest disease.

If you want to see a scorecard on COVID-19 drugs, you can check out two good sources. Expert panels are constantly updating treatment guidelines for both the National Institutes of Health and the Infectious Diseases Society of America.