OBS recommends steroids to treat COVID-19

The World Health Organization issued new guidelines Wednesday for the use of life - saving treatments, hours after a study showed that inexpensive steroids reduce the risk of death in patients with COVID-19. O instruction commission The BSH made a strong “recommendation for using cortichosteroid therapy for serious coronary cases, but not on those with milder cases. The instructions are based on the results of eight clinical trials with 7,184 participants. One of these studies was released Wednesday.

The study, published Wednesday, included scientists from Brazil, Canada, China, France, Spain, Britain and the United States.

Co-ordinated by the British National Institute for Health Studies, it is part of the World Health Organization's efforts to quickly test various drugs.

Researchers analyzed three different steroids: dexematone, hydrocortizone, and methylprenizolon, although the number of patients it tested was too small for a reliable result.

University of Bristoli professor epidemiologist Jonathan Sterne is part of the team that analyzed the results.

“40 percent of patients who received common treatment or placebon died if you see the data on all of this evidence. In patients who received cortichosteroids, death and the risk of death after 28 days was reduced by 32 percent. So eight of the 100 patients were saved from treating cortichosteroid, or 20 percent reducing risk of life”, he says.

Oxford University researchers had reached a similar conclusion in June and the results of clinical testing were published on Wednesday in a study in the medical journal JAMA.

Prof. Sterne says that drugs are used against inflammation, and they are only suitable for serious patients, although cortichosteroids were effective, whether patients are using respiratory when treatment began.

One of the reasons patients get so seriously ill with COVID-19 is that their immune system is forced to work at the maximum. So the idea is that treatment with steroids calms the strong immune response, and that makes people survive when handling them”, says Professor Stern.

He adds that efforts to find other treatments are continuing because the 33 percent risk of death is still too high.

Patients were followed for a period of 28 days, and Professor Stern admits that it is a short time, but he says doctors will want to know what will happen for a long time and that in time more will be known.

The majority of deaths, if they happen, occur in the first 28 days, but all those who did clinical trials will want to follow patients for a longer time, to see if these results continue to be effective”, Prof says. Stern.

Britain and other governments worldwide have approved the use of cortichosteroids for seriously ill patients from COVID-19. Now their use is also recommended by WHO.