Not all women can donate plasma for covid 19 patients. Why?

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Plasma therapy has been widely used for the treatment of covid 19 patients.

What is plasma?

Plasma is the liquid in blood without the blood cells. Usually blood consists of 55% of plasma and 45% of blood cells. The plasma is a pale yellow liquid which consists of various nutrients, proteins, etc. And hence, it also consists of antibodies against the diseases which affected the patient. 

Why is plasma therapy used?

The covid 19 patients develop the antibodies against the corona virus which stay in the blood for lifetime. As the covid 19 patients completely recover,  they become eligible to transfuse plasma which consists of those antibodies.

The development of antibodies is very time consuming and so the patients are being transfused with plasma which already consist of developed antibodies. That means, the patient directly receives antibodies through the plasma and can be recovered faster.

Eligibility criteria for plasma transfusion:-

• Patient must be completely recovered and test negative for corona.
• Donation must be only after 14 days of infection.
• The donor should not have uncontrolled diabetes, chronic kidney disease, lung disease, liver disease and hypertension.
• The donor's age must be above 18 and below 60.
• Donor must weigh around 50 kg.
• Donor's haemoglobin level must be above 8.
• Women donors must not be pregnant ever or have children.

Why women who have been pregnant can't donate plasma?

During pregnancy, the foetus in women's womb consist of genetic material both from father as well as mother. And hence the women develops antibodies against the father's genetic material. The genetic material is known as Human Leucocyte Antigen [HLA] whereas the antibody developed is HLA antibody. 

When the plasma containing HLA antibody is transfused to covid 19 patients then the complication called Transfusion Related Acute Lung Injury [TRALI] can be caused.

The covid 19 patients already have weakened lungs and transfusion of plasma consisting of HLA antibodies can be very dangerous.

And higher the number of children more the number of antibodies formed. Hence women with children are strictly not eligible for plasma donation.

The good news is....the eligible patients can donate plasma again after 15 days of previous donation. 

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