LONDON, April 9 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A coronavirus treatment already approved in the UK and US which uses blood from recovered patients can help the infected get better within three days, a study has found.
This is coming as the global infection passed 1.4 million on Tuesday with 81,049 deaths and 300,759 recoveries.
The efficacy of the new breakthrough treatment was highlighted with 10 COVID-19 patients in China who were severely ill in hospital and saw their symptoms disappear or rapidly improve within 72 hours after the therapy.
They were given a dose of plasma donated from COVID-19 survivors, which had the antibodies necessary for their immune system to clear the virus. Known as convalescent plasma therapy, it has recently been given the green light by medical regulators in the UK and US to try on critically ill coronavirus patients.
The promising therapy, which was first used a century ago in the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, has been used already in China and the US.
The US recorded 1,150 coronavirus deaths in 24 hours, Johns Hopkins University said late Monday, pushing the country’s toll further above the 10,000 mark reached earlier in the day.
According to Johns Hopkins’ running tally, there are more than 366,000 cases of new coronavirus in the United States — including in excess of 30,000 new cases in 24 hours — with total deaths at 10,783.
The US has by far the most number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the world.
The number of deaths recorded since the start of the pandemic has for the past several days increased by at least 1,000 per day and is gradually approaching the number of deaths in Italy (16,523) and Spain (13,005).
France has become the fourth country to register more than 10,000 deaths of coronavirus patients, with 7,091 recorded in hospital and 3,237 in old age homes, according to a government official.
A total of 7,131 people were being treated in intensive care, top health official Jerome Salomon told reporters, warning that “the epidemic is continuing its progression.”
Meanwhile, a Romanian maternity unit was being investigated after 10 newborns tested positive for the novel coronavirus, with the suspicion they contracted the virus from healthcare staff.
“The mothers tested negative, but the babies tested positive so we have to consider their contacts with medical staff,” Health Minister Nelu Tataru said in an interview with the Antena 3 TV station.
The babies have no symptoms and all but one of them, together with their mothers, have gone into self-isolation at home.
Tataru pointed to the “failures in the activities of both maternity officials and the local public health directorate (DSP)” and promised severe measures if necessary. The local DSP chief has already been dismissed. — NNN-AGENCIES
