A new analysis shows how convalescent plasma can prevent hospitalizations and save lives.
Three years into the COVID-19 pandemic, new variant outbreaks continue to fuel economic disruptions and hospitalizations across the globe. Effective therapies remain unavailable in much of the world, and circulating variants have rendered monoclonal antibody treatments ineffective.
But a new analysis shows how convalescent plasma can be used as an effective and low-cost treatment both during the COVID-19 pandemic and in the inevitable pandemics of the future.
In a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases, an international team of researchers analyzed clinical data and concluded that among outpatients with COVID-19, antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 given early and in high dose reduced the risk of hospitalization.
“If the results of this meta-analysis had somehow been available in March of 2020, then I am certain that millions of lives would have been saved around the world,” says senior author Adam C. Levine, MD, MPH, a professor of emergency medicine at The Warren Alpert Medical School.
While several other early treatments for COVID-19 have had similar results, including antivirals like Paxlovid and monoclonal antibodies, only convalescent plasma, the researchers concluded, is likely to be both available and affordable for the majority of the world’s population both now and early in the next viral pandemic.
“These findings will be helpful for this pandemic, especially in places like China, India, and other parts of the world that lack access to antiviral medications like Paxlovid,” Levine says. “And because it provides information on how to more effectively use convalescent plasma as a therapy, this will be even more helpful in the next pandemic. This study is essentially a roadmap for how to do this right the next time.”
