GENEVA (Reuters) – The World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday released new clinical advice for the treatment of COVID-19 patients, including those who show persistent symptoms after recovery, and also said it recommended using low doses of anticoagulants to prevent blood clots. appearance.
“The other things in the guideline that are new is that COVID-19 patients should have the use of pulse oximetry at home, which is measuring oxygen levels so you can determine if something is deteriorating at home and that hospital care is better. to get. , ”WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris told a UN briefing in Geneva.
The WHO advised clinicians to place patients in an awake prone position on their stomach, which would improve oxygen supply, she said.
“We also recommend, we recommend the use of low-dose anticoagulants to prevent blood clots from forming in blood vessels. We recommend using lower doses instead of higher doses because higher doses can lead to other problems, ”said Harris.
She added that a WHO-led team of independent experts, currently in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the first human cases were detected in December 2019, will leave the quarantine for the next two days to continue its work with Chinese researchers. to put. virus origin.
She declined to commit to reports of delays in the roll-out of vaccines in the European Union. She said she had no specific data and that the WHO’s priority was for health workers in all countries to be vaccinated for the first 100 days of the year.
AstraZeneca, which co-developed its shot with the University of Oxford, told the EU on Friday that it could not meet its agreed delivery targets until the end of March.
Reporting by Stephanie Negripay and Emma Farge