Health expert suggests passive immunisation to slow COVID-19 spread

ISLAMABAD: An eminent haematologist and transplant surgeon, Dr Tahir Shamsi said on Tuesday China used the plasma of recovered COVID-19 patients to slow the march of the novel coronavirus that has thus far killed more than 30,000 people worldwide.

“China shared with the world information about techniques and medicines it used to control the contagion, one of them was passive immunisation.”

“The plasma of recovered patients was transfused into critically ill patients who responded well to the treatment as compared to other patients,” he said while speaking during ARY News’ talk show Power Play.

Dr Shamsi said this technique is known as passive immunisation, which was introduced in 1890.

He said passive immunisation was used to cure viral diseases such as influenza, measles and polio even before vaccines were introduced.

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The World Health Organisation (WHO) had recommended this technique for treatment of the Ebola virus epidemic in 2014, and before that, it was used to cure swine flu and other flu-like diseases in the world, he said.

This technique could be used to cure the coronavirus-affected people in Pakistan on a trial basis after approval of the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP).