Improved care reduces ICU mortality

Paris – Covid-19 treatments and improved hospital care have reduced death rates in intensive care by more than a third since the early months of the pandemic, but this progress might be stalling, according to research published yesterday.

Whereas medical staff in the first wave of the epidemic had few insights to help them tackle the new virus, they now have some effective drugs and therapies for treating severely ill patients.

A large-scale meta-analysis of overall mortality of Covid-19 patients in intensive care units (ICUs) around the world, published in the journal Anaesthesia, found that it had fallen to 36% by October.

An earlier analysis by the same authors found that ICU mortality had fallen from 60% in late March 2020 to 42% at the end of May.

“After our first meta-analysis last year showed a large drop in ICU mortality from Covid-19 from March to May 2020, this updated analysis shows that any fall in mortality rate between June and October 2020 appears to have flattened or plateaued,” the authors said.

Researchers looked at data from 52 observational studies involving 43 128 patients.

The studies were from Europe, North America and China – areas included in the earlier analysis – as well as reports from the Middle East, South Asia and Australia.

The authors said that hospitals now have much more knowledge about what works – and what does not.

In particular, medics now can use steroids like dexamethasone to improve the survival chances of seriously ill patients on oxygen support. –