The researchers recall that therapeutic plasma from patients cured of COVID was used from the first months of the pandemic, due to the already demonstrated effectiveness of the treatment during previous pandemics (1918-1920 flu and 2002-2004 SARS). The principle is based on the fact that the plasma of patients recently cured of a pathogenic infection generally contains a high concentration of antibodies which will reduce the severity of the infection in the transfused patients.
So, more than 500,000 patients have been treated with convalescent plasma in the United States alone and during the first year of the pandemic.
The study estimates today that
thousands more lives could have been saved during the COVID pandemic
– and more precisely between 16,476 and 66,296 lives in the United States between July 2020 and March 2021 – with wider use of plasma from convalescent patients, particularly in patients at high risk of severe form and/or complications as well as in patients hospitalized urgently for COVID.
The analysis was based on weekly convalescent plasma usage data, weekly mortality data, and death reduction data among treated patients in the United States:
- if 100% of patients hospitalized for COVID had received high-titer convalescent plasma within 3 days of admission between July 2020 and March 2021, between 40,000 and 215,000 additional lives could even have been saved during the first year of pandemic ;
- if 75% of outpatients had received therapeutic plasma, between 425,000 and 1,140,000 hospitalizations could have been avoided;
- if 15% of outpatients had received therapeutic plasma, between 85,000 and 230,000 hospitalizations could have been avoided.
“The therapy can actually and significantly reduce mortality, be immediately available and remains relatively inexpensive. We should be prepared to use it much more often and more widely in the event of an infectious emergency or pandemic.”concludes lead author Dr. Arturo Casadevall, distinguished professor of molecular biology and immunology at the Bloomberg School.
Early studies on the effectiveness of convalescent plasma, in the United States and other countries, showed mixed results, however the bias may have been related to its administration to hospitalized COVID patients already too ill to benefit. of therapy. This new study, like others, confirms that it is an effective strategy whose deployment must be prepared in the possible perspective of new pandemics.
“We should be prepared to implement outpatient centers to treat people early with convalescent plasma during a future outbreak. This requires providing spaces in hospitals reserved for this intervention, the clinical practice of which is now well established.”
