The World Health Organization on Wednesday updated its advice on coronavirus treatment to include “strong recommendation” for steroid use in patients who are critically ill, Reuters reported. This came after an analysis of seven international trials, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association or JAMA, showed that treating critical patients with corticosteroids reduces the risk of death by 20% regardless of which steroid is used.
The analysis pooled data from separate trials of low dose hydrocortisone, dexamethasone and methylprednisolone and found that they improve survival of coronavirus patients in intensive care units. “This is equivalent to around 68% of [the sickest] patients surviving after treatment with corticosteroids, compared to around 60% surviving in the absence of corticosteroids,” the researchers said in a statement. They said the findings were impressive, but also stressed steroids were not a cure for the infection.
Steroids are already used in conditions like arthritis and asthma, as well as in some severe infections as they reduce inflammation.
The WHO’s clinical care lead, Janet Diaz, said the agency has updated its advice to include use of steroids for patients in severe condition. “The evidence shows that if you give corticosteroids...[there are] 87 fewer deaths per 1,000 patients,” she said at a live event. “Those are lives saved.”
Jonathan Sterne, a professor of medical statistics and epidemiology at Britain’s Bristol University who worked on the analysis, said steroids were both cheap and readily available. “Our analysis has confirmed that they are effective in reducing deaths amongst the people most severely affected by Covid-19,” he told the briefing.
The trials were conducted by researchers in Britain, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Spain, and the United States. Sterne said the results were consistent throughout, irrespective of the age, sex or how long the person had been sick.
Martin Landray, another professor at the University of Oxford, who also worked on the dexamethasone trial, said doctors across the world can safely switch to using the drugs to save lives. “These results are clear, and instantly usable in clinical practice,” he told reporters. “Among critically ill patients with Covid-19, low-dose corticosteroids...significantly reduce the risk of death.”
Globally, the coronavirus has infected more than 2.59 crore people and killed over 8.61 lakh, according to the Johns Hopkins University’s tracker. Over 1.69 crore people across the world have recovered from the infection.
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