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The COVID-19 virus does not discriminate between the elderly and the young. Even children are vulnerable to this disease. Sometimes, they also develop serious complications that can turn fatal. Health professionals have been trying to find an effective treatment procedure for these children since the beginning of the pandemic. But sadly, to date, no therapy has been shown to be safe and effective for children who develop life-threatening complications from contracting the SARS-COV-2 virus.
One possible treatment that has been explored in adults with complications is the use of convalescent plasma, which is derived from patients who have recovered from COVID -19 and can be administered to currently ill patients to generate an antibody response that renders the patient inert. virus. But now, in a major study that brings hope to many, researchers have shown that convalescent plasma appears to be a safe and possibly effective treatment for children with life-threatening COVID-19 cases. Early positive results were seen in adults who received convalescent plasma, but the treatment had not been studied in children until now.
Effective therapy in children with serious complications.
Researchers from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) study say that some children who contract this virus can develop very serious complications. So, even with limited data in adults, it was worth exploring the use of convalescent plasma as a possible treatment option. This study is the first report of convalescent plasma in children with life-threatening COVID-19 and involved researchers in a wide variety of disciplines, including immune dysregulation, transfusion medicine, infectious diseases, occupational health, critical care, hematology, oncology, immunology. , and rheumatology.
Treatment did not cause antibody-dependent improvement
The study, published in the journal Pediatric blood and cancer, involved four patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome. The researchers measured donor antibody levels and recipient’s antibody response before and after infusion of convalescent plasma to determine if there were any adverse reactions. In the four patients studied, the use of convalescent plasma was not associated with antibody-dependent enhancement, in which antibodies developed during a previous infection cause a worsening of the response with subsequent infections, a concern that has been described in preclinical models of other coronaviruses. . Furthermore, convalescent plasma did not suppress the endogenous antibody response.
Plasma therapy works best in the early stages of the disease
According to the researchers, convalescent plasma may provide the greatest benefit for patients who are in an early stage of their disease and have not yet generated endogenous antibodies. While the small sample size of this study does not allow for definitive conclusions, the researchers believe this method is safe. They say future research should include randomized controlled clinical trials to more definitively examine the efficacy of convalescent plasma in treating children infected with COVID-19. Last month, a study published in the American Journal of Pathology, found that people treated early in their illness with donated plasma that has the highest concentration of anti-COVID -19 antibodies are more likely to survive and recover.
(With input from IANS)
Posted: September 10, 2020 9:56 am
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