British woman says dexamethasone saved her from COVID-19

A British woman credited the steroid drug dexamethasone on Wednesday (June 17) with saving her life from COVID-19 after being hospitalised in critical condition.

 

Katherine Millbank said she was losing hope in the ICU when she began the drug trial.

 

"I remember them saying to me vaguely about the drug trial, and I thought, you know, if anything could help, go for it," Millbank said in an interview with British television.

 

Millbank says that trial, which was dexamethasone, along with the support of her husband Paul, helped her recover from the coronavirus.

 

Millbank said she was eternally grateful to NHS researchers and encouraged others to particpate in offered drug trials.

 

"If you were asked to go on a drug trial at the end of the day, you don't know." said Millbank, "it could be your sister, your brother, your husband, anybody could catch this disease, so the best thing is full heartedly say, yes, please, because it's helped so many of us. Say yes."

 

Trial results announced on Tuesday (June 16) by researchers in Britain's Oxford University showed dexamethasone, a generic drug used since the 1960s to reduce inflammation in diseases such as arthritis, cut death rates by around a third among the most severely ill coronavirus patients admitted to hospital.

 

That makes it the first drug proved to save lives in fighting the disease. Countries are rushing to ensure that they have enough of it on hand, although medical officials say there is no shortage.

 

Some doctors were cautious, citing possible side-effects and asking to see more data.

 

Britain has increased the amount of dexamethasone it has in stock and on order to 240,000 doses, health minister Matt Hancock said on Wednesday.

 

Meanwhile, the head of the WHO's emergencies program, Mike Ryan, said the drug should only be used in those serious cases where it has been shown to help.

 

The dexamethasone study's results are preliminary, but the researchers behind the trial said it suggests the drug should become standard care in severely stricken patients.

 

For patients on ventilators, the treatment was shown to reduce mortality by about a third, and for patients requiring only oxygen, deaths were cut by about one fifth, according to preliminary findings shared with the WHO.

 

South Korea's top health official expressed caution about dexamethasone and the European Union and Switzerland both said they were awaiting more information.

 

An Italian expert said that dexamethasone was no silver bullet.

 

As the new coronavirus has wreaked havoc on global economies, some countries have moved quickly to authorize emergency use of medicines only to later backtrack.