FDA Authorizes Use of Convalescent Blood to Treat COVID-19 Patients - ForumDaily
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FDA Authorizes Use of Convalescent Blood to Treat COVID-19 Patients

Experts say that such treatment may be a hope for some patients until more complex drugs are developed, writes NBC News.

Photo: Shutterstock

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will allow doctors across the country to start using plasma donated by coronavirus survivors to treat critically ill patients due to COVID-19. This has been made possible by the new emergency protocols approved on March 24th.

The FDA made the decision the day after New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the State Department of Health plans to begin treating the most severe patients with coronavirus using antibody-enriched plasma from recovered blood.

Treatment using plasma from a recovered person dates back centuries and was used during the 1918 influenza pandemic, in the era before modern vaccines and antiviral drugs appeared. Some experts argue that this may be the main hope for the fight against coronavirus until more complex treatment methods are developed, which can take several months.

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“The approach definitely has its merits, and what's remarkable is that it's not a new idea; she's been with us for a full hundred years or longer,” said Dr. Jeffrey Henderson, assistant professor of medicine and molecular microbiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. “I think we don't know if the method will be effective, but based on its track record with a number of other viruses, I think it has a very good chance.”

Henderson is part of a nationwide network of doctors and researchers led by a team at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore that is working to develop protocols for using plasma to treat people suffering from COVID-19.

This method—essentially harvesting virus-fighting antibodies from the blood of previously infected patients—was associated with milder symptoms and shorter hospital stays for some patients during the 2002 SARS outbreak. And initial reports from China suggest convalescent plasma may also be effective in suppressing COVID-19.

In accordance with the emergency protocols approved by the FDA, doctors can request permission to treat critically ill patients with COVID-19 in each case. At this time, experimental treatment will be reserved for patients who are in serious condition and are at risk of death. The agency said the FDA will respond to most inquiries within 4-8 hours. For patients who require faster treatment, doctors can call the FDA Emergency Management Department and get permission by phone.

If treatment is safe and effective, it is best for patients before the symptoms become too severe, experts say. Past research has shown that proactive plasma injections of convalescents can also be effective in protecting first-line healthcare workers from a serious illness.

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The FDA warned that plasma transfusion has not been proven to be an effective method of controlling COVID-19 and that researchers who wish to test this method more widely should apply for permission to start testing.

“The promising convalescent plasma has not been shown to be effective in every disease studied,” the FDA said in an announcement. “It is therefore important to determine whether it is safe and effective before administering plasma to COVID-19 patients in clinical trials.”

Experts believe that the widespread use of plasma, if approved in the coming weeks, will require significant coordination between hospitals and national blood banks.

In New York, health officials said they plan to begin enrolling patients who have fully recovered from COVID-19 in the coming days. Those efforts will likely begin in New Rochelle, a New York suburb that was the center of the state's initial outbreak several weeks ago because of the concentration of people who have already recovered, officials said.

“This is just a test,” Cuomo said on March 23. “This is a test for people who are very sick, but the New York State Department of Health has been working on this with some of the best health care facilities in New York, and we think it's promising and we're going to start this week.”

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