If this is indeed as promising as it sounds, do we know if the EU, China, or India are pursuing it as an option? It seems as though at least one of the major players should/would be working on it.
If this is indeed as promising as it sounds, do we know if the EU, China, or India are pursuing it as an option? It seems as though at least one of the major players should/would be working on it.
Admittedly I've never donated plasma, but I was under the impression it was a more involved process than donating blood and took well over an hour per draw. Can common plasma donation centers even...
Joyner told The Times that 600 COVID-19 survivors donating their plasma each day could, depending on donation volumes and concentrations, generate up to 5,000 IG shots. With millions of probable survivors in the United States, he said, capacity isn’t a problem.
Admittedly I've never donated plasma, but I was under the impression it was a more involved process than donating blood and took well over an hour per draw. Can common plasma donation centers even handle that many people in a day?
So really you need 2100 or so screened, healthy covid survivors willing to donate twice per week to keep a running production of, at best, 35000 shots per week. In a perfect scenario with a lab...
So really you need 2100 or so screened, healthy covid survivors willing to donate twice per week to keep a running production of, at best, 35000 shots per week. In a perfect scenario with a lab running 12 hours a day, and an hour and a half per draw with donors cycling like clockwork, you could draw from 8 people per station per day, meaning you'd need 75 machines plus disposables.
75 machines running all day with perfect donors for two weeks could provide two months of immunity for everyone in a mid-size town, also assuming perfect shot manufacturing and distribution.
I mean, if there were war-effort levels of motivation to make it happen, I guess I could see it working, but it seems like one of those things that at a small scale makes sense but at a population level would be wildly difficult and impractical. Maybe I'm missing something, but even 100 healthy, reliable, tested donors willing to consistently show up and have a needle in them for an hour and a half seems like a really tall order.
Not to say there isn't a market for rich people to have blood boys, but society-wide I can't imagine it.
Scientists have devised a way to use the antibody-rich blood plasma of COVID-19 survivors for an upper-arm injection that they say could inoculate people against the virus for months.
Using technology that’s been proven effective in preventing other diseases such as hepatitis A, the injections would be administered to high-risk healthcare workers, nursing home patients, or even at public drive-through sites — potentially protecting millions of lives, the doctors and other experts say.
The two scientists who spearheaded the proposal — an 83-year-old shingles researcher and his counterpart, an HIV gene therapy expert — have garnered widespread support from leading blood and immunology specialists, including those at the center of the nation’s COVID-19 plasma research.
But the idea exists only on paper. Federal officials have twice rejected requests to discuss the proposal, and pharmaceutical companies — even acknowledging the likely efficacy of the plan — have declined to design or manufacture the shots, according to a Times investigation. The lack of interest in launching development of immunity shots comes amid heightened scrutiny of the federal government’s sluggish pandemic response.
There is little disagreement that the idea holds promise; the dispute is over the timing. Federal health officials and industry groups say the development of plasma-based therapies should focus on treating people who are already sick, not on preventing infections in those who are still healthy.
[...]
Advocates for the immunity shots say businesses are reluctant to invest in a product that could soon be replaced by a vaccine, so the government should offer financial incentives to offset that risk. Billions of federal dollars are already being spent on vaccine research through Operation Warp Speed, and funding for an IG shot that could serve as a bridge to a vaccine would come with a relatively modest price tag, they say.
[...]
Joyner, of the Mayo Clinic, said there are probably 10 million to 20 million people in the U.S. carrying coronavirus antibodies — and the number keeps climbing. If just 2% of them were to donate a standard 800 milliliters of plasma on three separate occasions, their plasma alone could generate millions of IG shots for high-risk Americans.
“At a hot-spot meatpacking plant, or at a mobile unit in the parking lot outside a mall — trust me, you can get the plasma,” Joyner said. “This is not a biological problem nor a technology problem. It’s a back-of-the-envelope intelligence problem.”
The antibody injections, for now, do not appear to be a high priority for the government or the industry.
If this is indeed as promising as it sounds, do we know if the EU, China, or India are pursuing it as an option? It seems as though at least one of the major players should/would be working on it.
I don't know about other countries but plasma therapy has been approved as covid treatment for sometime in India now and seen some success with it.
Admittedly I've never donated plasma, but I was under the impression it was a more involved process than donating blood and took well over an hour per draw. Can common plasma donation centers even handle that many people in a day?
You also can't draw plasma every day. Most donation centers limit you to two donations per week.
So really you need 2100 or so screened, healthy covid survivors willing to donate twice per week to keep a running production of, at best, 35000 shots per week. In a perfect scenario with a lab running 12 hours a day, and an hour and a half per draw with donors cycling like clockwork, you could draw from 8 people per station per day, meaning you'd need 75 machines plus disposables.
75 machines running all day with perfect donors for two weeks could provide two months of immunity for everyone in a mid-size town, also assuming perfect shot manufacturing and distribution.
I mean, if there were war-effort levels of motivation to make it happen, I guess I could see it working, but it seems like one of those things that at a small scale makes sense but at a population level would be wildly difficult and impractical. Maybe I'm missing something, but even 100 healthy, reliable, tested donors willing to consistently show up and have a needle in them for an hour and a half seems like a really tall order.
Not to say there isn't a market for rich people to have blood boys, but society-wide I can't imagine it.
I’d say we could just pay people to donate their antibody rich plasma, but I know that’d just lead to bug seekers (is that the right term?)
From the article:
[...]
[...]