HONG KONG: Those who will become seriously infected with A (H1N1) influenza in the coming months will have new hope as a result of research carried out by a local university and the Hospital Authority (HA). The study used antibodies collected from recovered patients to treat other patients who have come down with the rapidly-spreading virus.

The University of Hong Kong's Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine said the kind of treatment has proven effective in treating epidemics since the last century.

Studies on the Spanish influenza of 1918 found that human blood products drawn from convalescent patients substantially reduced the mortality rate from 37 percent to 16 percent.

The medical faculty believes similar treatment will be essential when the city inevitably confronts the coming second wave of human swine flu during the winter months.

Ivan Hung Fan-ngai, clinical assistant professor of medicine department, predicted that the situation in Hong Kong will follow the trend in the Southern Hemisphere which has seen a worsening pandemic during the cold season.

"The pandemic in Australia abruptly deteriorated once it entered winter. Hong Kong is more densely populated, so the disease may spread more rapidly than in Australia," Hung said. "Unlike anti-viral drugs, such as tamiflu, which only stop replication, immunoglobulin prepared from convalescent plasma can kill the virus."

Beginning next week, the Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service will invite 840 donors from 8,000 patients who have recovered from human swine flu to come for blood screenings at the Red Cross headquarters donor center. Eligible candidates will be asked to donate 500 ml of plasma.

Candidates should be between 18 and 55 years old and weigh 50 kg or above.Each healthy donor can give plasma once a month.

The 420 liters of convalescent plasma collected will then be processed into immunoglobulin, a kind of antibody, to be used to treat patients who become seriously ill from the virus.

To compare the efficacy of the immunoglobulin, a control group of another 63 patients will be given simple antibodies.

Lee Cheuk-kwong, the Red Cross's senior medical officer, assured that the risk to donors and recipients is rare and limited to hypersensitivity, according to past studies. Patients also must give consent prior to treatment.

The HA will spend HK$2 million for the project.

Hung said he hoped the immunoglobulin could be harvested by next January, in order to cope with the winter peak of seasonal flu in February and March. Lee added the processed antibodies would be effective over two years.

(HK Edition 08/27/2009 page1)