A new American study shows that transfusion of convalescent plasma brings certain benefits to patients seriously affected by COVID-19.
The Houston Methodist Hospital was the first medical center in the country on March 28 to inject the plasma of a person who recovered from COVID-19 to another patient, the latter in very poor health.
Doctors at this Texas hospital have since donated convalescent plasma to 25 patients as part of the study. Of these, 19, or 76% of them, improved after treatment, and 11 were discharged from hospital.
Safe
These results appeared a few days ago in theAmerican Journal of Pathology is the first peer-reviewed scientific publication for this therapy in the United States.
The authors of the scientific article did not notice any side effects attributable to the transfusion of this blood component. They say it is a safe avenue to help very suffering patients, although specialists agree that it has yet to be studied.
Patients at Houston Methodist Hospital were treated urgently, sometimes because their lives depended on it. There was not a second group of patients receiving placebo, as was the case in controlled clinical trials.
Not new
Doctors have noted that the benefits of convalescent plasma are similar to those seen when taking this experimental antiviral drug, remdesivir.
Plasma is a blood product where antibodies are found. The treatment therefore consists in taking the plasma from healed people and injecting it into sick people in the hope that this will give them passive immunity.
This technique has been used with relative success to fight several previous viruses, like the Ebola virus in 2015, and its origins date back to the beginning of the 20e century.
Since the antibodies are not produced by the patients themselves, the protection offered is not as strong as that provided by a vaccine and is generally short-lived. The quantity of plasma available is also limited.
In the absence of a proven treatment for COVID-19, doctors in Texas believe that this therapy still has its merits.
A previous study published by the American Academy of Sciences of 10 patients with convalescent plasma also pointed to an improvement in symptoms.
In Canada, a national clinical study is continuing on this treatment. Héma-Québec also continues to solicit donors who have recovered from COVID-19.
– With the QMI Agency
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