Dödligt virus från Kina orsakar panik (SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19)

The team looked at the records of 412 patients admitted to several US hospitals between March and July 2020. About 24% of the patients received aspirin within 24 hours of hospital admission, or in the seven days before hospital admission. But most, 76%, did not receive the drug. Aspirin use was associated with a 44% reduction in mechanical ventilation, a 43% reduction in ICU admission, and a 47% reduction for in-hospital mortality, the researchers found.

Other studies have made similar findings. One study, published in the journal PLOS One, looked at more than 30,000 US veterans with Covid-19, and found those already taking aspirin had half the risk of dying as those not prescribed the daily pills.

The research was led by Eli Magen, from the Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon, Israel. His team tracked data on nearly 10,500 people who were tested for COVID-19 during the first wave of the pandemic in Israel, from February to the end of June of last year.

But Magen's group found that people who'd already been taking low-dose aspirin to reduce their risk of heart disease had a 29% lower risk of contracting COVID-19 compared to those who didn't take aspirin, and that rates of aspirin use were much lower among COVID-19 patients than among those who didn't get infected.