Three Coronavirus (COVID-19) patients treated at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem with an experimental passive vaccine treatment by administering Immunoglobulin G (IgG) have fully recovered, giving hope for other patients.
The three were treated as part of a clinical study, jointly conducted by Hadassah Hospital and the public biomedical company Kamada.
Some three months ago, Hadassah Medical Center started collecting plasma rich with antibodies from recovered Coronavirus patients, with the aim of producing a treatment for severely ill patients.
The plasmas collected from the recoverees were processed by the Kamada company at Kibbutz Beit Kama in the Negev for an IgG-based antibody treatment for patients in severe condition, patients who suffer from pneumonia due to the virus.
Representing approximately 75% of serum antibodies in humans, IgG is the most common type of antibody found in blood circulation.
The first three patients who recovered as part of the clinical study demonstrated a rapid clinical benefit and have been discharged home from the hospital.
Hadassah administered the world’s first passive vaccine to a seriously ill patient, a young woman with previous illnesses whose CT results showed completely white lungs, and all known treatment methods have not affected her condition.
Several hours after receiving the treatment, the patient’s condition appears to have stabilized, giving room for cautious optimism.
Kamada updated in its reports that the virus neutralization test showed encouraging neutralization activity of the product and that the company plans to further test the antibody product as a potential preventative treatment for COVID-19 on healthy volunteers at risk.