The study involving 43,128 patients reported that death rates may yet be reduced further through vaccination programmes. Photograph: Dado Ruvić/Reuters
The study involving 43,128 patients reported that death rates may yet be reduced further through vaccination programmes. Photograph: Dado Ruvić/Reuters
Tue 2 Feb 2021 04.32 EST
Last modified on Tue 2 Feb 2021 07.23 EST
Death rates among people who end up in intensive care with Covid-19 have improved dramatically since the start of the pandemic thanks to advances in treatment, new research has found.
The proportion of those worst affected by the disease who die from it has fallen from 60% when it first appeared early last year to 36% by October, the study of global trends shows.
Death rates among people who end up in intensive care with
Covid-19 have improved dramatically since the start of the pandemic thanks to advances in treatment, new research has found.
The proportion of those worst affected by the disease who die from it has fallen from 60% when it first appeared early last year to 36% by October, the study of global trends shows.
That drop continues a positive trend that saw the mortality of almost 60% seen at the end of March decrease to 42% at the end of May, it reports.
The findings, based on 52 studies around the globe involving 43,128 patients, have been published in the medical journal Anaesthesia.
First published on Sun 31 Jan 2021 15.31 EST
Critically ill Covid patients are dying unnecessarily because they are refusing to go on ventilators due to unfounded fears that the machines increase the risk of death, senior doctors have warned.
The Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine (FICM), the body that represents the 3,500 doctors working in intensive care across the NHS, has seen an increase in patients wrongly believing that the devices will kill them.
The misconception appears to stem from the fact the death rate in ICUs has fallen at the same time as doctors have reduced their use of ventilators, which can take over the body’s breathing process when disease has caused the lungs to fail.
The cheap drug that saves lives by revolutionising Covid treatment
The treatment was immediately rolled out across NHS hospitals
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Dexamethasone has become the “backbone” of the hospital treatment of patients with Covid-19, a senior medic said.
The cheap steroid was found to reduce death rates by up to a third among some hospital patients.
The entrance to one of five Covid-19 wards at Whiston Hospital (PA)
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Dexamethasone has become the “backbone” of the hospital treatment of patients with Covid-19, a senior medic said.
The cheap steroid was found to reduce death rates by up to a third among some hospital patients.
The University of Oxford-led clinical trial was hailed as “the world’s first coronavirus treatment proven to reduce the risk of death”, after the team reported its trial results in June last year.