HYDERABAD: As the world reels under the shadow pandemic of post-Covid syndrome with lakhs of patients reporting seemingly vague yet life-altering symptoms like lethargy, blackouts, difficulty in concentration to even breathlessness and reduced immunity levels, researchers from AIG Hospitals, Asian Healthcare Foundation, Centre For Cellular And Molecular Biology (CCMB) and Institute of Life Sciences of the University of Hyderabad have found that the monoclonal antibody cocktail therapy is effectively reducing these to negligible levels.
The study titled, Effectiveness of REGEN- COV antibody cocktail against the B.1.617.2 (Delta) variant of SARS Cov 2, published in the Journal of Internal Medicine found that inflammatory markers in those administered these antibodies was significantly less. In comparison to those who got standard care with Remdesivir had higher levels in the inflammatory markers, serum ferritin levels and absolute neutrophil counts.
“Post-Covid symptoms generally occur in patients in whom the viral load is very high. To combat this high viral load, the body often goes into overdrive, producing antibody responses to eliminate the virus. It is this antibody response, which causes damage to internal organs and leads to the increase in inflammatory markers,” explained Dr D Nageshwar Reddy, Chairman, AIG Hospitals.
“We have also studied the response of the antibody cocktail on Delta variant in lab conditions and found them to effectively neutralise the virus which is going to be of significant use in future studies,” said Dr Kishore Parsa, Senior Principal Research Scientist, Dr Reddy’s Institute of Life Science, University of Hyderabad.
It is owing to this action of the monoclonal antibodies that researchers are exploring if it can be given as a prophylaxis to high-risk individuals as it acts within a day’s span whereas a vaccine may take a month.
“Vaccines produce a wide range of antibodies and so REGEN-COV antibody therapy is no substitute for the vaccine, but it could be given as a post-exposure prevention medicine in case one in the family is infected and the other members need to be shielded from severe infection,” added Dr Reddy.
More studies needed, say experts
Dr Karthik Bharadwaj of the CCMB stated that the claim that the Delta Plus variant will cause a high spurt in cases, leading to the third wave, is yet to be proven. He believes that only when the studies prove the claim, it will be considered a variant of concern
167 cases
of Covid-19 were recorded in Telangana on Tuesday after conducting 37,941 tests. The State also saw 207 recoveries, taking the active cases to 3,933. There was one death reported , which increased the toll to 3,959. The highest cases were reported in GHMC with 66 cases, followed by 10 cases each in Karimnagar, Medchal and Rangareddy