While waiting for a vaccine or a cure, doctors around the world are effectively getting better at treating patients with COVID-19 and saving many lives. Doctors in hard-hit areas of Europe like Italy and the UK began in late February reaching out to Doctors in China for advice on treating patients with COVID. According to Dr. Marco Rizzi at Papa Giovanni XXIII hospital, quoted in the Wall Street Journal “There was everything in there, including traditional Chinese medicine”, “now we have more cards to play”. Using their own clinical experience and by collaborating with the doctors around the world, frontline doctors now have treatment strategies that are saving many lives. Using traditional Chinese medicine herbs such as ginger, honey, and lemon tea and other herbs to support the body’s fight in those advised to treat themselves at home, even things like rice cereal to help patients keep their strength up in its fight against the disease. In patients that do end up in hospital doctors are using oxygen therapy, steroids, anti-inflammatory drugs, and blood thinners on the sickest of patients. The doctors in Europe are saving lives and reducing the number of patients needing intensive care.
“ We are doing better,” Tim Cook told the Wall Street Journal. Tim Cook is an anesthesia consultant and professor at the University of Bristol he added: “ but it’s a horrible disease”. He looked at multiple studies from around the world and found that deaths in intensive care from COVID had declined from 60% in March to 42% in May. The study also found mortality rates are similar for Asia, Europe, and North America.
About 80% of COVID cases are relatively mild and can be treated at home. The Chinese recommend lots of warm fluids, warm foods that are easy to digest, warm herbs such as ginger tea, and lots of rest. In addition, several herbal formulas are being used that are currently under clinical trials in Asian countries. Ginger the most acceptable of Chinese herbs to western doctors, is a natural spice that has been used as an herbal medicine for common health problems for thousands of years. One systematic review of 109 random controlled trials found evidence of ginger’s effectiveness in treating nausea and vomiting, gastrointestinal function, pain, inflammation, metabolic syndromes, and respiratory symptoms all crucial in reducing the severity of COVID infections. Ginger has been found effective in the majority of the studies. Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) and asthma were examined to evaluate the improvement of symptoms. Ginger effectively reduced the duration of mechanical ventilation and the length of stay in the intensive care unit in ARDS patients; it also improved asthmatic symptoms. The US National Institutes of Health said that while they may help with symptom relief, its overall effectiveness against the coronavirus is as of yet inconclusive.
If they can catch patients early before their oxygen drops too low in severely sick patients they can be put on high levels of plain oxygen instead of a ventilator. They can also be laid on their stomachs instead of on their backs which makes it much easier to breathe.
The Chinese made no mention of cardiovascular risks but that has been a greater problem in Europe and America perhaps because of greater levels of obesity in the US and Europe. Doctors in the region of Lombardy were the first to start putting patients on blood thinners to help reduce the risk of blood clots.
In one large clinical trial in the UK, doctors found that using the steroid dexamethasone reduced deaths by up to one third in the sickest of patients and other trials have found that the drug hydroxychloroquine touted by President Trump, had zero benefits.
None of these approaches are effective against the virus itself but rather support the body in its fight against the disease the only anti-viral that has been shown to be moderately effective against the virus is remdesivir which is expensive and not widely available around the world but more are being tested every day.
Now that the world has failed to contain the disease the best approach, in the long run, is going to be a vaccine. The best candidate right now for a safe, effective vaccine is the Oxford vaccine currently in phase three clinical trials. The Serum Institute in India is the world’s largest producer of vaccines and they recently announced plans to produce hundreds of millions of doses of the Oxford vaccine even before the clinical trials are finished in a huge gamble. if the vaccine does not pass trials they will lose all of their investment but if it works the company will be way ahead of the rest of the world in having a vaccine ready to distribute. According to researchers at Oxford, they think they have about an 80% chance of the vaccine being effective in preventing the disease and it has already passed rigorous safety studies. Other countries like Russia have skipped safety studies so scientists are rooting for the Oxford vaccine as the best hope right now, Keep your fingers crossed.
read more in the Wall Street Journal. https://www.wsj.com/articles/some-modest-good-news-on-covid-19-doctors-are-getting-better-at-treating-it-11596195903
Read more on the Serum Institute’s gamble on the Oxford vaccine in the New York Times
Ginger on Human Health: A Comprehensive Systematic Review of 109 Randomized Controlled Trials