UK Approves Dexamethasone for Severe COVID-19 Cases, Reducing Mortality

According to the preliminary results of Recovery in charge of clinical trials, dexamethasone, a drug from the corticosteroid family, known for its powerful anti-inflammatory effect, has immunosuppressive properties sufficient to reduce mortality by a third in severe cases of covid-19.

For these serious cases, which require a lot of oxygen, dexamethasone "already available and at a lower cost", should be their essential drug, said Prof. Peter Horby of the University of Oxford, one of the heads of the trial.

After a comparative analysis between 2,104 patients subjected to the daily treatment of 6 mg of dexamethasone (orally or by intravenous injection) for ten days, and 4,321 patients under normal treatment for 28 days, it appears that 41% of the latter needed mechanical respiratory assistance, 25% intermediate oxygen, and 13% did not require respiratory assistance.

In other words, with the dexamethasone-based treatment, there would be one death for about 8 ventilated patients or one death for about 25 patients requiring only oxygen.