TAMPA, Fla. — While coronavirus cases continue to rise across the state, researchers finally have a sort of breakthrough in finding a treatment.
A new study from Oxford University says dexamethasone has shown promise in the U.K. and could save lives.
"It's a corticosteroid. Lots of people take it," Dr. Michael Teng with USF Public Health said.
Teng says the steroid is used for people with inflammatory diseases like arthritis, and Oxford University's new study shows promise for coronavirus patients.
"If it is true, this is actually really good, because dexamethasone actually has a pretty good safety profile, and it's used worldwide. It's relatively cheap," Teng said.
But the drug can only be used as a treatment for those that have a severe case of COVID-19.
"If eight patients receive this treatment when they actually need it, if they are on mechanical ventilation or oxygen, then we can save one patient from dying," Dr. Seetha Lakshmi said.
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Lakshmi is an infectious disease doctor at Tampa General Hospital and a professor at USF Public Health. She says the steroid has been used to treat coronavirus patients at TGH since the beginning of the outbreak.
"This is a tool in the tool kit. This is not an end-all cure or prevention in any way. It just minimizes the damage," Lakshmi said.
That's why more 130 vaccines are being tested to see if they'll provide herd immunity, meaning a large amount of the population will be immune to the virus. A vaccine is the only way to stop COVID-19 from spreading.
"Historically, we have not had the best success coming up with a coronavirus vaccine because the antibodies seemingly last for a short period of time, not a long period of time," Lakshmi said.
Vaccines must go through three phases before getting approval:
After testing for safety and dosage, they'll go through safety trials and efficacy tests to see if enough immunity is seen COVID-19 patients. Then they can be approved. So far, a vaccine tested by Moderna and another from Oxford University has shown the most promise.
While the search for a vaccine continues, Lakshmi doesn't want people to take their eyes off the rising number of positive coronavirus cases across the country.
"I know it's very attractive to think about herd immunity, but I think we need to think about at what cost. We are working on vaccines. We are working for better therapeutics. We still need to buy time before we see such a great deal of burden to the society in terms of people getting sick," Lakshmi said.
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