BioCentury
ARTICLE | Product Development

Argentina study moves needle away from convalescent plasma for COVID-19 

October 6, 2020 2:32 AM UTC

A randomized, placebo-controlled trial in Argentina has found that convalescent plasma is not effective in severe COVID-19 patients, casting more doubt on the efficacy data FDA used to back the countermeasure’s emergency use authorization.

The results from the double-blind PLASM-AR study compound the questions about convalescent plasma that were raised with NIH’s decision in early September not to include the therapy in its COVID-19 treatment guidelines; as well as the agency’s expansion two weeks ago of two randomized, placebo-controlled studies of the intervention...