The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) approved clinical trial protocol to be administered for critically ill COVID-19 patients for conducting convalescent plasma therapy for the treatment of critically ill COVID-19 patients.
Kerala gets nod for trial of plasma therapy.
The ICMR has given its nod to the state government for the first-of-its-kind project, initiated by the prestigious Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST) in Kerala.
Drugs Controller General’s approval and institutional ethics committee approval would have to be there before the treatment can be administered.
The therapy takes antibodies from the blood of a person who has recovered from a virus.
It transfuses those antibodies into a person sick with that virus.
Those antibodies that are secreted by immune cells known as B lymphocytes, are found in plasma, or the liquid part of blood that helps the blood to clot when needed and supports immunity.
Once a person has had the virus and recovered, that person has developed antibodies that will stay in their blood waiting to fight the same virus should it return.
Those antibodies, when injected into another person with the disease, recognize the virus as something to attack.
The scientists say antibodies attack the spikes on the outside of the virus, blocking the virus from penetrating human cells.
Convalescent plasma is also known as passive antibody therapy, meaning that while it can immediately provide a person with antibodies to fight a virus, those antibodies only last a short period of time in the recipient’s body.