As if now no certain therapy is approved for COVID-19 and trials are being undertaken for the treatment of the pandemic, recent study results revealed that convalescent plasma (CP) potentially improved the clinical outcomes by neutralizing viremia (presence of the virus in the blood) in severe COVID-19 patients.

This prospective study enrolled 10 patients of severe COVID-19 and they were transfused with a single dose of 200 mL CP obtained from recently recovered COVID-19 donors, along with supportive care and antiviral medicines. The primary and secondary end-points were safety and improvement in symptoms of the patients within 3 days after CP infusion respectively.

After CP transfusion, an improvement in symptoms was observed and the level of neutralizing antibody increased rapidly in the patients. Within 3 days saturation of oxyhaemoglobin, lymphocyte counts increased and C-reactive protein decreased. In seven patients the blood viral load was undetectable after transfusion. The CP therapy could be investigated further with larger clinical trials for dose optimization, time point and clinical benefits.