New Delhi: Contradicting claims that the plasma therapy has emerged as a breakthrough treatment option for COVID-19, the Union government on Tuesday said that it should only be used for research and trial purposes until solid scientific evidence emerges in favour of it.
The government also indicated that if not done well, plasma therapy could lead to life-threatening complications.
“Plasma therapy is being experimented with and there is no evidence to support it as a treatment. It is only at an experimental stage. If not used properly, it can create life-threatening complications,” said Lav Agarwal, joint secretary of the health ministry, adding that efficacy of the therapy is being studied by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) currently.
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“ICMR is conducting a nation-wide research to study the efficacy of plasma therapy,” Agarwal told the media.
The government’s word of caution came at a time when multiple instances of severely-affected COVID-19 patients recovering through the therapy have been reported. Many hospitals treating COVID-19 have already started storing plasma from cured patients.
The therapy involves injecting the blood-component from a cured person into the body of a patient. It is believed that if plasma of a cured person is administered correctly in a positive case, it would carry the antibodies that would help boost the immune system of the diseased.
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The Delhi government had recently said that six critical COVID-19 patients showed signs of recovery after undergoing the plasma therapy. The national capital’s Lok Nayak Hospital has already been using the therapy while the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) is reported to start experimenting the treatment on critical patients.
Maharashtra, too, had announced that it would administer the treatment to one patient at the Mumbai’s Lilavati Hospital as a trial case.
Meanwhile, Agarwal said that the death toll owing to coronavirus has risen to 937, while the number of affected cases have climbed to 29, 974 as on Tuesday. As many as 7,027 people have recovered until now, the health ministry official said, adding that, in the last 24 hours, the recovery rate has now improved to 23.3%.
“684 cases have been found to be cured in the last 24 hours, showing a progressive increase in the recovery rate,” he said.
He also added that 17 districts in the country have reported no cases in the last 28 days.
The Centre also wrote to chief secretaries of all states to ensure that all private medical facilities remain functional to treat people needing critical healthcare like blood transfusion, dialysis, and chemotherapy. The health secretary Preeti Sudan spoke about reports of many private hospitals and clinics insisting on a COVID-19 test before treating incoming patients. She said that the test can only be done as per ICMR-approved guidelines, and requested the chief secretaries to see such incidents do not happen.