Kerala looks at plasma from recovered patients to treat the sick person

Ruchika Uniyal | TNN | Apr 8, 2020, 08:29 IST

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With a vaccine for Covid-19 still a long way off, experts in India and US will now test if blood from coronavirus patients who have recovered could hold the key to treating the sick. The convalescent plasma therapy includes giving patients plasma from those who have developed antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes Covid-19) through transfusions.
A task force of doctors and scientists set up by the Kerala government has already prepared and submitted a protocol for this therapy with the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR).
Dr Asha Kishore, director of Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST), an Institution of National Importance under the department of science and technology, in Thiruvananthapuram, said that since convalescent plasma was an experimental therapy at this stage, it would be undertaken as a research project to assess its effectiveness. “Our institute’s transfusion medicine department headed by Debashish Gupta will lead the project in the state. We have the state government’s approval and ICMR nod is awaited,” she told TOI on Tuesday. Dr Anoop Kumar, a member of the task force and critical care physician at Baby Memorial Hospital, Kozhikode, said the task force was set up three weeks ago. “All procedures to start the therapy are in place. We have started counselling recovered patients to see if they would be willing to donate and have collected their details,” he said.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has already approved use of such therapy in clinical trials and for critical patients. In China as well, therapeutic products derived from convalescent plasma of recovered patients were administered to other patients to treat them.
The concept itself is not new. Convalescent plasma was used in outbreaks of the H1N1 influenza virus pandemic in 2009, SARS-CoV-1 epidemic in 2003 and the MERS-CoV epidemic in 2012. It was also used to help stop outbreaks of measles and mumps before vaccines were available.