The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped by more than 800 points in futures trading on Thursday after a report showed that a drug meant to treat coronavirus had promising results.

The Dow Jones has cratered after a historic drive upward after the coronavirus pandemic began to shut down economies all over the world.

Futures traded upward on the news that Remdesivir, a Gilead Sciences drug, was shown to be effective in treating coronavirus patients with severe symptoms in a trial at a Chicago hospital.

The stock market could also have been responding positively to the Trump administration revealing a plan by Dr. Deborah Birx to slowly ease the restrictions on economic activity.

S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures were also up sharply on the drug news.

"This is obviously good news. Of course, we've heard a few other pieces of good news like this recently and they didn't pan out as well as people had hoped," said market strategist Matt Maley to CNBC.

"The big question is whether it's going to be enough to help the economy 'reopen' more quickly than people are thinking right now," he explained.

About 22 million Americans have lost work because of the economic shutdown ordered by state and local governments to help stop the spread of the virus that originated in Wuhan, China.

Here's more about the new coronavirus treatment: