Lav Aggarwal: Plasma therapy isn't a proven therapy for treating COVID-19

Lav Aggarwal, Joint Secretary, Health Ministry while briefing the media on Tuesday said,"Plasma therapy isn't a proven therapy. It's still in experimental stage, right now ICMR is doing it as an experiment to identify & do additional understanding of this therapy. Till it's approved no one should use it,it'll be harmful to patient & illegal."

Plasma therapy is being experimented, however no evidence that this can be used as a treatment. National level study has been launched by ICMR to study it's efficacy, said the Joint Secretary. 

Until ICMR concludes its study & a robust scientific proof is available, Plasma therapy should be used only for research or trial purpose. If plasma therapy is not used in proper manner under proper guideline then it can also cause life threatening complications, added Lav Aggarwal. 

In Plasma therapy, immunity can be transferred from a healthy person to a sick patient using convalescent plasma. This therapy uses antibodies from the blood of a recovered COVID-19 patient to treat another critical patient.