Health authorities are warning people against self-medicating with a drug which is traditionally used to treat head lice and scabies but is now showing promise as a coronavirus treatment, saying it could be fatal.

Key points: Ivermectin stops the virus growing in lab tests but the researchers need to find out if it is effective in humans and at what dose it is safe

Ivermectin stops the virus growing in lab tests but the researchers need to find out if it is effective in humans and at what dose it is safe It is unclear how the drug acts to stop coronavirus

It is unclear how the drug acts to stop coronavirus It could be months before human clinical trials begin

A collaborative study led by the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute and the Doherty Institute found the drug Ivermectin stops coronavirus growing in cell culture.

The next step is to determine whether it can effectively treat coronavirus in humans, and learn what a safe dosage would be.

Ivermectin has been used around the world for years as a treatment for a range of conditions including head lice and scabies, and it is available as a pill, lotion and shampoo.

While today praising the work of the researchers involved in the study, Victorian Health Minister Jenny Mikakos urged people not to misuse the substance.

"There is no reason to be buying lice treatment unless you're going to be using it on your children's hair," Ms Mikakos said during a press conference updating Victorians on the coronavirus pandemic.

"I just want to stress that because we've heard about people overseas who have heard about potential developments and then have ingested drugs that have been used in a completely inappropriate way and have died as a result.

"I don't want to see people rushing out to their pharmacies or their supermarkets buying lice treatments now because scientists are doing this work.

"It is lethal to swallow this shampoo. We will end up with people in hospital."

Ms Mikakos also expressed concern people might hoard the drug, leaving none for people who needed it for proven uses — something which had happened with other medications.

Health experts have warned about hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine's potential side effects and lack of scientific evidence for effective COVID-19 treatment ( Reuters: Shannon Stapleton )

A US man recently died and his wife was hospitalised after they ingested a fish-tank cleaning chemical which contained a form of chloroquine, another drug which had shown some potential as a coronavirus treatment.

Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute researcher Kylie Wagstaff, who led the Ivermectin study, said the team was "cautiously optimistic" about the drug's potential.

"What we've shown is that using the drug Ivermectin we can stop the virus that causes COVID-19 growing in cells in a Petri dish," Dr Wagstaff said.

"What we need to figure out now is whether those safe dosages that we know work in people are also effective on the virus."

Kylie Wagstaff says it will be some time before researchers know whether Ivermectin can be an effective treatment for COVID-19. ( Supplied: Monash University )

Ivermectin is a US Food and Drug Administration-approved anti-parasitic drug that has previously been shown to be effective in vitro against a broad range of viruses including HIV, dengue, influenza and zika.

Anti-parasitic drugs, which attack organisms already in the body, are different to vaccines, which train the body's immune system to fight the disease before it is infected.

Although the mechanism by which Ivermectin works on the virus is not known, it is likely, based on its action in other viruses, that it works to stop the virus "dampening down" the host cells' ability to clear it, Dr Wagstaff said.

The findings of the study were published overnight in the journal, Antiviral Research.

Victorian Deputy Chief Health Officer Annaliese van Dieman said the early results from the study were "great".

However, she emphasised the experiments were "in a Petri dish and not in people" and studies took a long time to progress to clinical treatments.

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Dr Wagstaff said it would be between a few weeks and a couple of months before tests could begin on human subjects.

"We're cautiously optimistic," she said.

"It definitely works on the virus in the lab. The dosage is going to be the key.

"With all anti-viral medications it's about how much can you safely give a person and how much do you need to kill the virus inside a human being and the balance between those two things is always the important point.

"So it's definitely exciting, it's definitely worth considering, so we're moving forward with cautious optimism."

Geelong biosecurity research facility to get $220 million upgrade

The findings come as the Federal Government commits $220 million to upgrade a high-security biosecurity research facility in Geelong where vaccines for the virus are being tested.

The CSIRO-operated Australian Animal Health Laboratory (AAHL) is being renamed the Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness.

CSIRO chief executive Larry Marshall said the laboratory was originally created to protect Australia from animal diseases such as foot and mouth, swine fever, and invasive species.

"But the emergence of Hendra virus in Australia demonstrated that diseases do not differentiate between animals and humans, so neither will we, as we step up our preparedness and response to both in a more holistic way," he said.

"The centre will continue to build on the expertise delivered through AAHL's extensive biosecure laboratories combined with CSIRO's expertise across science disciplines to predict, prevent and manage disease, and turn the breakthroughs of Australia's medical research community into real-world solutions for our greatest challenges, like pandemics."