Still a disappointed hope in the fight against the new coronavirus?
Transfusing Covid-19 patients with plasma taken from people who have been infected and now cured does not reduce their chance of being seriously ill or dying, according to the first clinical study on the subject, the conclusions of which were published this week. Friday.
But serotherapy still has advantages.
Since the spring, plasma therapy has aroused great enthusiasm.
Many researchers, in all countries, are working on treatments to best treat the disease, while waiting to be able to benefit from a vaccine, but very few are leading for the moment to largely convincing results.
Since the treatments were missing, the method was authorized on an exceptional basis in France, pending a Coviplasm study led by AP-HP and Inserm, and widely authorized in the United States as well as in India, where the study made today has been carried out.
Transfusion of plasma containing antibodies has been shown to be effective in treating Ebola virus or SARS, which is in the same family as the new coronavirus.
In early June, an article published in the American Journal of Pathology reported the results of an American trial on 25 patients affected by a severe form of covid-19;
the authors claimed that the results were all the more encouraging as they did not present problematic side effects.
The randomized study, funded by the Indian Council for Medical Research, enrolled between April and July 464 adult patients, with an average age of 52 years, in dozens of public and private hospitals in India.
Two groups were formed.
A control group of 229 patients received usual care, while 235 patients received two convalescent plasma transfusions in addition to usual care.
After 28 days, unfortunately 44 participants (or 19%) from the plasma group and 41 (or 18%) from the control group developed a severe form of the disease or died.
"Convalescent plasma did exactly what the researchers hoped for - direct antiviral action of the neutralizing antibodies on SARS-CoV-2 RNA - but there was no net clinical benefit for the patients," the authors acknowledge. of the study, published in the scientific journal BMJ.
Two positive remarks, however, soften the conclusions of this study.
First, the UK's National Health Service, which conducts the same type of plasma test, noted that the Indian test used donated plasma containing between 6 and 10 times less antibodies. than those collected in the UK.
This could mean that at higher doses the benefits could be greater.
And on the other hand, for the moderate patients, the Indian study highlighted a difference for the plasma group: they suffered less from shortness of breath and endured less fatigue.
Likewise, the virus was less often detectable in them after seven days in their analyzes.
