Covid-19 Plasma treatment: Maharashtra to undertake country’s largest plasma therapy trial, check details

The variance in the amount of antibodies is due to many factors including age, immunity, severity of infection among others.

COVID-19 plasma treatment: Maharashtra is now set to undertake the country’s largest plasma therapy trial! The state of Maharashtra which has been battling the worst spread of Coronavirus will conduct the largest plasma therapy trial in the country. As part of the trial, more than 21 medical colleges will be roped in the process and over 472 severely ill patients will be treated with plasma to understand the effectiveness of the plasma therapy treatment of Coronavirus, the Indian Express reported.

More importantly in view of the reluctance among people to donate their plasma, the government has also decided to incentivise the process and each donor will be provided Rs 2000 for donating her blood sample. In the plasma therapy treatment, the patients who have recovered from the infection donate their blood sample which carries the vital antibodies that fight against the disease. However, not all patients who have recovered from the disease have a large number of antibodies present in their blood. The variance in the amount of antibodies is due to many factors including age, immunity, severity of infection among others.

Termed ‘Platina trial’, the initiative undertaken by the state Medical Education department has already got in touch with over 3000 eligible donors who have recovered from the disease and will be counseled to donate their plasma. The department is hopeful that it will be able to convince at least 20% of the lot to donate their plasma. The initiative was announced a month back by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and an amount of Rs 16.65 crore has also been sanctioned from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund for the same.

Dr Sanjay Mukherhee, who recently got transferred from the post of state secretary of the Medical Education department told the Indian Express that all preparations for the trial have been undertaken and the trial will begin soon. He also said that the trial is in fact the world’s largest trial cum treatment project and will be undertaken at 21 medical colleges spread across the state.

Dr Mohammed Faizal, state coordinator of the Platina project told the Indian Express that the trial was aiming for severely ill patients and each patient will be administered 2 doses of 200 ml plasma. He also said that out of the 250 plasma donations which have taken place so far, 100 patients have benefited from the treatment.

He also said that while all the medical colleges in the state are functioning as Plasma banks, there has been reluctance to donate as the scare of the disease is present in even those patients who have recovered from it. He further said that the department will tap the upcoming religious festivals like Eid and Ganesha Chaturthi to encourage more recovered patients to come to the rescue of others.