Out of the 11 patients, 8 saw improvement in the infections they were suffering from - and which are known to cause death in COVID-19 patients – leading to their release sometime between seven and 30 days later. The other three patients died of their illness.
The researchers led by Dr. Moshe Yeshurun, head of the Bone Marrow Unit at the hospital, stressed that the findings were initial and too limited to derive a concrete conclusion about cannabis’s influence on the term of the illness but that the findings did justify continued research with a larger group of COVID-19 patients.
Yeshurun and his team decided to test CBD on COVID patients due to the success they have seen in reducing infections in patients who have undergone bone marrow transplants with CBD. Patients who receive bone marrow transplants are at risk of developing complications when the transplanted cells from the donor identify the recipient as foreign.
This can trigger a reaction that leads the donated cells to attack the patient who received the transplant. Yeshurun and his team have found that Cannabidiol minimizes that risk.
“After giving the cannabis oil we saw a drop in signs of the infection and this is definitely encouraging and gives a foundation to continue the research,” Dr. Iliya Kagan, head of the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit, said of the recent study on coronavirus patients
Kagan said that after the oil was administered the decline of some of the patients – who were all in serious condition – appeared to stop “although it is still premature to determined with certainty that it is a result of the cannabis.”
Kagan said that the hospital is now recruiting patients to participate in a more extensive study to explore CBD’s effect and if it will support the initial optimistic findings.