SARS-CoV-2 Infection of Rhesus Macaques Treated Early with Human COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma
Jesse D. Deere, Timothy D. Carroll, Joseph Dutra, Linda Fritts, Rebecca Lee Sammak, JoAnn L. Yee, Katherine J. Olstad, J. Rachel Reader, Amy Kistler, Jack Kamm, Clara Di Germanio, Yashavanth Shaan Lakshmanappa, Sonny R. Elizaldi, Jamin W. Roh, Graham Simmons, Jennifer Watanabe, Rachel E. Pollard, Jodie Usachenko, Ramya Immareddy, Brian A. Schmidt, Shelby L. O’Connor, Joseph DeRisi, Michael P. Busch, Smita S. Iyer, Koen K. A. Van Rompay, Dennis J. Hartigan-O’Connor, Christopher J. Miller
Abstract
Antiviral treatment options for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) remain very limited. One treatment that was explored beginning early in the pandemic (and that is likely to be tested early in future pandemics) is plasma collected from people who have recovered from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), known as convalescent plasma (CP). We tested if CP reduces viral shedding or disease in a nonhuman primate model. Our results demonstrate that administration of CP 1 day after SARS-CoV-2 infection had no significant impact on viral loads, clinical disease, or sequence diversity, although treatment with normal human plasma resulted in selection of a specific viral variant. Our results demonstrate that passive immunization with CP, even during early infection, provided no significant benefit in a nonhuman primate model of SARS-CoV-2 infection.