Use of convalescent plasma therapy in coronavirus-infected patients does not help in reducing mortality or progression to severe COVID-19, a multi-centric study funded by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has found. The 'open-label parallel-arm phase II multicentre randomized controlled trial' (PLACID Trial) was conducted across 39 public and private hospitals across India between April 22 to July 14 to investigate the effectiveness of convalescent plasma (CP) for the treatment of COVID-19, it said. The convalescent plasma (CP) therapy involves taking antibodies from the blood of a person who has recovered from COVID-19 and transfusing those antibodies into an active coronavirus patient to help kickstart the immune system to fight the infection.

A total of 464 participants (moderately ill COVID-19 patients admitted to hospitals) were enrolled for the study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed and has appeared on medRxiv, a preprint server. The National Task Force for COVID-19, a committee formed by the ICMR to respond to the pandemic, has reviewed and approved this study, it said. The Clinical Management Protocols for COVID-19 issued by the Union Health Ministry on June 27 allowed use of convalescent plasma (Off label) for treating coronavirus-infected patients in moderate stage of the illness under "investigational therapies"