Maharashtra Government proposes to set up plasma banks in every government-run medical college and hospital to treat hyper, critical and supercritical Covid-19 patients. Minister of Medical Education Amit Deshmukh told FPJ, ‘’The pilots carried out for the application of plasma therapy have shown promising results. Now the department has taken a decision to conduct 250 trials of plasma therapy across the state. Therefore it was decided to create a bank at every government medical college and hospital so that plasma can be applied for treatment by following due process. The government medical college at Nagpur will initially drive this entire exercise.’’
Deshmukh said the government medical colleges and hospitals will store the plasma donated by Covid-19 negative patients on their will. ‘’ The ethical committee will take a call on the use of plasma stored in their bank to treat Covid-19 positive patients. The proposed plasma bank will be on the lines of the blood bank,’’ he noted. He clarified that plasma therapy will be in addition to the other therapies applied to treat coronavirus patients.
Deshmukh said the plasma therapy involves injecting antibodies capable of fighting a virus into a COVID-19 carrier so as to provide an immediate boost in immunity and aid a carrier's immune system in battling the virus. The plasma containing antibodies is separated from the blood of an individual who has fully recovered from the virus. This plasma can then be frozen and stored for up to more than 2 and a half years.
The department officer argued that plasma therapy is a safe treatment option for patients with severe Covid-19 symptoms.
