Workers at the UW Medicine vehicle testing facility. (Photo by AP / Ted S. Warren)
There is good news on the COVID front involving a cure for people who have already suffered from the disease in Israel, and doctors there have reported quite dramatic results. Dr. Mercer Island, Dr. Gordon Cohen, joined Seattle’s Morning News to discuss what it entails.
“The good news in Israel is that they had 30 patients who had moderate to severe COVID-19 and were given a treatment developed in Tel Aviv as part of a phase one study … designed to treat a component of the disease on which we talked about, which is the cytokine storm. This is the body’s reaction to the virus and this overwhelming immune response that causes flooding of the lungs and inflammation of all organ systems that often leads to death, “he said.
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“So in this case, they deliver an inhaled protein – the CD 24 protein in the lungs – and they found that it dramatically attenuated the cytokine storm that is taking place and, in fact, virtually cured 30 out of 30 patients and 29 out of 30 of them. in just a few days. So it was a pretty dramatic response. ”
The treatment is not only inhalable, but seems to have fewer side effects from the beginning than other COVID treatments.
“They inhale once a day for a few minutes at a time and do it for five days and directly target the lungs, which is really the place of the cytokine storm. It really differs from other treatments – which we offer to the whole body, we administer them systemically – and they have a lot of side effects. This doesn’t really have many side effects associated with it, Dr. Cohen seems.
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