The World Health Organisation (WHO) has published guidance for clinicians and health care decision-makers on the use of corticosteroids in patients with COVID-19.
This was disclosed in a statement released by the organisation on Wednesday
“We recommend systemic corticosteroids for the treatment of patients with severe and critical COVID-19. We suggest not to use corticosteroids in the treatment of patients with non-severe COVID-19 as the treatment.”
Corticosteroids are listed in the WHO model list of essential medicines, readily available globally at a low cost.
This guidance, according to the statement was developed in collaboration with the non-profit Magic Evidence Ecosystem Foundation (MAGIC), which provided methodologic support to develop and disseminate living guidance for COVID-19 drug treatments.
According to WHO, work on the guidance began on 22nd June when the recovery trial published a preliminary report on the impact of corticosteroids.
To supplement the results, WHO partnered with investigators of seven trials on corticosteroids to conduct a meta-analysis of these trials, in order to rapidly provide additional evidence to build on recovery data and inform guidance development.
The guidance was thus informed by combining data from all these randomized trials of systemic corticosteroids for COVID-19.
WHO provides guidance that works across all contexts for all countries and health care systems.