Bengaluru-based HCG Cancer Hospital has received permission to conduct clinical trials in humans for Cytokine therapy for treating COVID-19 patients.
The hospital completed studies in animals recently. "Our team of doctors at HCG, along with iCrest, have been working to develop the cytokine mediated anti-COVID therapy," a statement from the hospital read.
This work was started in the immunology lab at HCG hospital to create a treatment for COVID-19 with assistance from Lancet Resource Centre. The team working on this are Dr Gururaj Rao, Dr Jyothsna and Dr Vishal Rao. This is the same team of doctors who have started Phase-I clinical trials in convalescent plasma therapy for COVID-19 patients and recently extracted plasma from two COVID-19 patients who h1ad recovered from the disease.
"We have made a concoction of cytokines which are released by our immune system against a virus which are known to be effective against COVID-19 too. Unfortunately, patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 are unable to produce them. What we have done is using cytokines of healthy donors," said the statement.
"We will hopefully create the first set of injections soon for Phase 1 clinical trials as we have received clearance from the Drug Controller General of India now," the statement further added.