The National Institutes of Health today awarded the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore a $4.3 million grant to test plasma in treating COVID-19.
Einstein and Montefiore launched a Phase 2 clinical trial to evaluate the efficacy of convalescent plasma in treating COVID-19 in April. The $4.3 million will support the randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, according to a news release.
The NIH grant did not go directly to the principal investigators of the trial, but instead to the Clinical and Translational Science Awards program, which funds the Block Institute for Clinical and Translational Research at Einstein and Montefiore (ICTR).
Convalescent plasma therapy received FDA approval for investigational use in an open-label protocol in March. Researchers at Einstein and Montefiore are pursuing the “gold standard” of a clinical trial to determine if the plasma can alleviate COVID-19 symptoms and reduce mortality rates…