Today the whole world is fighting with the pandemic caused by the COVID-19/Sars-Cov2 virus. This pandemic have severely affected our lives.
COVID-19 Originated in Wuhan city of china
The first case of corona was identified in 2019 and it have bluging structures that's why it is called as COVID-19. Corona got its new name SARS-COV2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 ) on 11 February 2020.  This name was chosen because the Coronavirus is genetically related to SARS virus which was responsible for the SARS outbreak of 2003.
Currently in India there are 626k cases (3 July, Friday 10:00pm) and these cases are increasing day by day, every day we see a new spike. In India the cases are increasing by the rate of 2x but the best thing is that the recovery rate is also high and this is because of some treatment techniques adopted by ICMR. 
The Convalescent Plasma Therapy
From past few months you all must be hearing a lot about The Convalescent Plasma Therapy. Plasma therapy is one among few treatments that have shown promising results in fighting coronavirus cases. Recently plasma therapy helped to save the life of Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain.
What is The Convalescent Plasma Therapy?
The word convalescent means that somebody who is recovering from a disease and plasma is the major component of Blood.
Our Blood is mainly formed by 2 components The watery liquid plasma and some formed bodies. Here some formed bodies are Erythrocytes or Red Blood Cells, leucocytes or White Blood Cells and Thrombocytes or The platelets. 
The 55% of total blood consists of Platelets and 45% of total blood consists of the Erythrocytes & 1% is the leucocytes and Platelets
Plasma is yellowish alkaline viscous fluid. The major portion of plasma is made up of Water. Plasma also contains some other elements such as proteins (Albumin, Globulin, Fibrinogen), Inorganic salts, food material ( glucose and amino acid, Regulatory substances ( hormones and minerals) and Antibodies.
  • In Plasma therapy we use those antibodies present in plasma.
   A bag containing one unit of fresh frozen plasma.As we know that the 90% of plasma is made up of water (H2O) But rather than being colourless our plasma is yellow in colour.This is due to the Bilirubin Pigment present in Plasma (Yes ! Bilirubin is the same pigment present in our Liver and in Bile.)(image credits -Permission is granted to copy, distribute and modify this document under the terms of the GNU_Free_Documentation_License,Version 1.2)

What are Antibodies?
Antibodies are Immunoglobulin proteins (Igs) produced in the body In response to the antigen or foreign bodies.
In layman's language antibodies are the proteins released by our body in response to fight against antigens or pathogens.
Pathogens are the virus, bacteria, protozoa which attack on the body of host  for shelter and nutrition.
Structure of antibody and antigen binding site. Antibody have certain receptors in the epitope against the particular antigen. The antigen binds to the epitope and get destroyed. Antibody attacks the antigen by binding them with epitope. 

Now let's understand the basic concept of Plasma therapy.
Let's assume there is a Person A .
Person A is young and healthy with strong immune system. 
Person A gets affected by Corona virus.
 A pathogen i.e Corona virus have affected the body of Person A . So in response to that antigen/pathogen his body will produce antibodies. 
The normal body will produce antibodies within 14-15 Days of infection.
Generally two type of Immunoglobulin proteins are released
  • IgM (Ig mu)
  • IgG (Ig Gamma)
•IgM - Ig mu is the oldest immunoglobulin.  The percentage of it in antibody is 5-10%.
IgM activates the B cells to release more immunoglobulin.
•IgG - Ig Gamma is the immunoglobulin present in huge amount. The percentage of it in antibody is 95%.
Usually IgM is most effective in killing bacteria but in case of viruses IgG is most effective. IgG protects the body by phagocytosis of viruses.
  1. So Firstly the IgM immunoglobulin is released.
  2. IgM activates B cells to release more immunoglobulin i.e IgG.
  3. IgG  immunoglobulin are released in huge amount and they kill the antigens / Pathogens.
Now the Person A has recovered from the Corona virus and also now his body has natural antibodies against corona virus.
If again the virus will infect person A then the person A will get recovered between 2 to 3 days with mild or no symptoms because now he is having the self-made antibodies . This type of acquired immunity is called as Natural Active immunity. 
 Now let's assume their is a person B .
Person B is Old, weak and his immune system is not very strong. He gets infected by Corona virus. So now again same process will occur but the immune system of the person B is so weak that he might not survive for 14 days (14 days time take's place for formation of antibodies)
 So now what we will do is that we will take the plasma of person A (donor) and will infuse this plasma in Person B (recipient).
So person B will get readymade antibodies and he will recover in 2-3 days.
This type of immunity is called as passive immunity.
The infusion of plasma from a healthy donor (person A) to a recipient (person B) is called as plasma therapy.
Their are two type of infusions-
  • Blood infusion - In blood infusion we transfer the blood of donor in the body of recipient but in blood infusion the blood groups of the recipient and donor should match otherwise the recipient will die. That's why today donor with O blood group is in demand. (O blood group is a universal donor).
  • Plasma infusion - In plasma infusion we will extract the plasma from the blood by centrifugation and will transfer only the antibodies in the recipient.
We need volunteers who can donate their blood. Usually there are less people who donate their blood.
Plasma therapy is less feasible because there are so many infected patients and less recovered patients. Out of those recovered only 50-60% will volunteer for blood donation.
Solution to this problem can be that scientists can check the sequence of antibody ( which is a protein) .
Try to produce that same sequenced antibody by Hybridoma Technology.
Still Plasma Therapy is a controversial topic because some scientists agree on it while others don't. 
In the end we can conclude that plasma therapy is not the permanent cure for Coronavirus But Maybe we can rely on plasma therapy as the best way to fight the virus, until the vaccines are available.
Plasma therapy is definitely a saviour untill the vaccines are available.
Thankyou guys!
Stay safe & stay healthy. 
सावधान रहें सतर्क रहें!