South China Morning Post
Plasma from recovered patients used in virus fight
The China National Biotec Group announced on Thursday evening that virus-neutralizing antibodies had been detected in the plasma of patients who have recovered from Covid-19, and experiments have proven they can effectively kill the virus, according to a Beijing News report on Friday.
The company said it had successfully prepared the plasma for clinical treatment after strict blood biological safety testing, virus inactivation, and antiviral activity testing. The plasma had been used to treat 11 patients in critical condition, with significant results, it said.
The first phase of the treatment was carried out on three critically ill patients in Wuhan on February 8 and the plasma is currently being used to treat more than 10 critically ill patients.
Clinical tests showed that, after 12 to 24 hours of treatment, the main inflammatory indicators in the laboratory decreased significantly, the proportion of lymphocytes increased, key indicators such as blood oxygen saturation and viral load improved, and clinical signs and symptoms improved significantly.
“The plasma product to treat the novel coronavirus is made from plasma loaded with antibodies donated by recovered patients. It went through virus inactivation and was tested against virus-neutralizing antibodies and multiple pathogenic microorganisms,” the company said, according to the report.
More than 1,700 medical staff infected in China
At a press conference on Friday, Zeng revealed for the first time revealed that 1,716 medical workers were infected with the coronavirus.
Zeng said the number of medical workers infected as of Tuesday was 3.8 percent of the total infections on mainland China. Of those, 1,502 are from Hubei province, and 1,102 from Wuhan.
Coronavirus update:
Cases: 64,452
Deaths: 1,383
Recover: 6,768
©Wolf Broadcast | Night | 14 February 2020
Comments
Comments are disabled for this post.