Overview:

**COVID-19 RELATION**
Chloroquine Phosphate is the phosphate salt of chloroquine, a quinoline compound. The compound is used as an effective treatment against malaria caused by Plasmodium falciparum. Researchers are actively investigating this compound against the SARS-CoV-2 and have documented that that chloroquine phosphate may control the infection by promoting a virus-negative conversion and shortening the disease. The molecular studies suggested multiple potential mechanisms employed by the compound, including inhibiting viral endocytosis; limiting inflammatory response, and binding of Sigma 1 receptor to the SARS-CoV-2 Nsp6 protein.**

Antimalarial drug. Inhibits autophagy in a variety of cell lines (1). Induces cell death in breast cancer cell lines and displays antitumor and antimetastatic activity in mouse models of breast cancer (2). Eliminates cancer stem cells via deregulation of Jak2 and DNMT1 (3). Displays synergy when combined with Raf inhibitor, vemurafenib, in brain tumors (4). Cell permeable and active in vivo.

References:

1. HB Frieboes et al. JOP 2014 15:189

2. PD Jiang et al. Biomed. Pharmacother. 2010 64:609

3. DS Choi et al. Stem Cells. 2014 32:2309

4. JM Mulcahy Levy et al. Cancer Discov. 2014 4:773