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WHO advises against the use of convalescent plasma

2021-12-06T23:46:46.184Z


The WHO decided to discourage the use of convalescent plasma to treat patients with COVID-19. Here, the details of your new guide.


How does convalescent plasma treatment work?

(2020) 1:38

(CNN) -

The World Health Organization on Monday made a strong recommendation against the use of convalescent plasma to treat patients with covid-19, stating that there is no indication that it helps patients and that its administration it takes time and resources.

"The Guidelines Development Group (GDG) made a strong recommendation against the use of convalescent plasma in patients with non-serious illnesses, and a recommendation against its use in critically ill and critically ill patients, except in the context of a clinical trial. randomized, "the WHO said in the new recommendations published in the British Medical Journal.

Convalescent plasma is obtained from the blood of people who have recovered from an infection such as COVID-19.

Plasma is the liquid portion of the blood that contains immune cells and antibodies, that is, proteins that the body produces to fight infection.

Plasma can be infused into a sick person in the hope of speeding recovery from some illnesses.

The treatment has been around since the late Victorian era and has been used to treat two other deadly coronaviruses: MERS and SARS.

Scientists initially thought it was promising, and last August the US Food and Drug Administration authorized the emergency use of convalescent plasma as a treatment option for COVID-19.

WHO is cautious about plasma to treat covid-19 0:25

The Trump administration gave a great boost to that therapy, signing defense contracts of hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop the technologies for the use of convalescent plasma.

On a visit to the Red Cross, President Trump personally appealed to people recovering from COVID-19 to donate plasma "as soon as they can."

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But the science did not work.

Last September, a panel from the National Institutes of Health said there was no evidence to support the use of convalescent plasma to treat coronavirus patients and advised against its use as a standard of care.

In February this year, the FDA revised its emergency use authorization to limit its use to convalescent plasma for the treatment of hospitalized patients in the early stages of the disease.

Since then, study after study has shown that the treatment doesn't seem to have much of an effect against COVID-19.

The WHO arguments to advise against convalescent plasma

The WHO said it changed its recommendations because it recognized that "there is no clear benefit for critical outcomes such as mortality and mechanical ventilation for patients with non-severe, severe or critical illness, and (because of) significant resource requirements in terms of of cost and time for administration ".

In the case of patients with diseases that are not serious, the guide said it was not justified.

For critically ill and critically ill patients, there was "enough uncertainty" to justify continuing the trials.

The decision was based on evidence from 16 trials involving 16,236 patients with COVID-19 infection of varying severity levels.

Monday's guide also advises against the use of ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine and adds to the previous recommendations the use of corticosteroids in patients with severe or critical COVID-19 and the use of interleukin-6 receptor blockers, as well as conditional recommendations for their use. of monoclonal antibody treatments in some patients.

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2021-12-06

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