Aspirin is present in pretty much everyone’s household, and a lot of people were adding faith in it that it can save many COVID patients. The drug is also very affordable, and some might say that using it to treat COVID sounded almost too good to be true. But as it usually happens, the coronavirus is there once again to surprise us.
CNBC.com brings bad news for those who were optimistic about the chances of treating severe COVID illness with aspirin. While researchers from Oxford University had hoped to conclude that aspirin can help those hospitalized for COVID, the results turned out to be disappointing.
Aspirin doesn’t improve survival for those hospitalized with COVID
The researchers from Oxford University wanted to see if aspirin can help patients who are at an increased risk of developing clots in their blood vessels from the lungs and other areas of the body. The conclusion was that aspirin didn’t help to prevent deaths in COVID patients.
The study was part of a wider ‘RECOVERY’ trial for investigating possible treatments for hospitalized patients with COVID. Fifteen thousand patients were surveyed. About half of them received 150mg of aspirin every day, while the rest were given the usual care alone.
Peter Horby, joint chief investigator for the RECOVERY trial and also a professor of emerging infectious diseases, declared:
The data show that in patients hospitalized with Covid-19, aspirin was not associated with reductions in 28-day mortality or in the risk of progressing to invasive mechanical ventilation or death.
Horby also said:
Although aspirin was associated with a small increase in the likelihood of being discharged alive this does not seem to be sufficient to justify its widespread use for patients hospitalized with Covid-19.
The results of the study will appear on the pre-print site medRxiv.
