Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS) made headlines on 13 April after it revealed a breakthrough in coronavirus treatment. Regional media outlets have confirmed discovering a cure for COVD-19 by Pakistani investigators.
Experts at DUHS announced they had prepared intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) with plasma obtained from recovered patients with Coronavirus. The IVIG could treat COVID-19, experts at DUHS reported.
History, however, bears evidence that, in 1952, IVIG treatment was first used to boost human primary immune deficiency.
In addition, IVIG treatment is used in the USA and Europe to treat cases of Coronavirus by increasing their immune response. Yet with high mortality rates, both regions record hundreds of deaths per day, suggesting IVIG therapy is no solution to COVID-19.
In fact, IVIG is a form of passive treatment for vaccination that has been in use since 1890. Passive immunization is used when the risk of infection is high because there is little time for the body to develop an immune response and no vaccine is available.
Many respected news organizations had misreported the announcement, which could have given way to a false sense of optimism that could lead to complacency.
Dr. Tahir Shamsi, head of Karachi’s National Institute of Blood Diseases (NIBD), has earnestly promoted the use of passive immunization in Pakistan to treat cases of coronavirus.
Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, Chinese physicians used passive immunization and saved thousands of lives using that method in China.
The use of passive immunization in COVID-19 diagnosis has also been corroborated by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York.
Thanks to Dr. Shamsi’s efforts, Pakistan’s Drug Regulatory Authority (DRAP) recently approved clinical trials to assess the safety and efficacy of passive immunization. After recovering from the deadly infection, Pakistan’s 1st COVID-19 patient recently donated his plasma too.
Of the time being, passive immunization tests approved by DRAP remain the only technique involving plasma that the regulator has authorized to treat Coronavirus in Pakistan. Any other argument is pure embellishment.