A new study has revealed that he BCG vaccine, which is used to protect children from Tuberculosis (TB), can help in protecting people from coronavirus too.
Dr. Renu Agarwal, Medical Superintendent (MS) of COVID-19 Hospital in Uttar Pradesh’s Noida has revealed that the BCG vaccine rapidly strengthens the body’s immunity. The findings of the study are published in Indian Journal of Applied Research.
In stage 1 of the study, 30 medical and paramedical staff, doing covid duty in Noida District Hospital were administered BCG in April and none of them have become positive till date, with a control group of 50 people, out of which, 8 became positive.
According to the article published in the journal, a group of 80 employees was constituted on May 1 by Dr Renu Aggarwal. In the group, 30 people were vaccinated with BCG, while 50 were asked to work at COVID-19 hospital without being vaccinated.
All these employees were tested for coronavirus every 15th day using RT-PCR. About a month later, among the 50 employees who were not vaccinated, 16 were found infected. Subsequently a second group of 130 employees was constituted on August 24 and 50 were vaccinated. All 50 medical and paramedical staff were doing COVID-19 duties and none of them have tested positive yet. A control group of 80 staff members were taken, out of which 20 tested positive. Dr Agarwal said that she got herself vaccinated too and has remained free from coronavirus so far.
Majority of the staffs who were vaccinated with BCG were suffering from diabetes, hypertension and other serious diseases. The study mentioned that the effect of BCG vaccine was seen in the employees after one month. It is to be noted that no employee was infected despite suffering from serious illnesses and they are still working in COVID-19 hospital without being infected.
According to Dr Renu Aggarwal, when coronavirus cases started coming up in India, doctors in the US, the UK, England and Italy were giving BCG vaccine to health workers. She took inspiration from here and started the research after dividing the staffs of hospital into two groups. The findings of the study were published on November 4.
