People who survive an infection should have antibodies in their blood that can attack the virus.
The idea is you take the blood plasma (the part which contains the antibodies) and give that to a sick patient as a therapy.
The US has already treated 500 patients with what's known as "convalescent plasma", and other countries are getting involved too.
It is too soon to know when we might have a drug that can treat the coronavirus.
However, we should start to get the results of trials in the next few months. This is much earlier than we will know if a vaccine (which protects against infection rather than treat it) is effective.
This is because doctors are testing drugs that have already been developed and are known to be safe enough to use, whereas vaccines researchers are starting from scratch.
Some completely new, experimental, coronavirus drugs are also being tested in the laboratory but are not yet ready for human tests .
The most obvious reason for wanting a treatment is it will save lives, but it could also allow some lockdown measures to be lifted.
Having an effective treatment would, in essence, make coronavirus a milder disease.
If it stopped people who were admitted to hospital from needing ventilation, then there would be less risk of intensive care units being overwhelmed, so controls on people's lives may not need to be as strict.
If you are infected by coronavirus, then for most people it would be mild and can be treated at home with bed-rest, paracetamol and plenty of fluids.
But some people need more intensive hospital treatment, which involves oxygen support such as ventilation.
“More than 150,000 people have died with Covid-19, but there are still no drugs proven to help doctors treat the disease”.
Proven by whom?
I’ve read numerous accounts of different drugs that are very beneficial in treating the virus/disease.
I’m sick of all the BS.