Plasma can help save lives, but some students are seeking to take advantage of the pandemic, potentially making things worse.
There are many ways to help others. When the charitable bug bites, you might buy groceries for a neighbor in need, or help someone do their hair when they aren’t able to do it on their own. Some people donate money to causes they care about, and others volunteer their time to get something done. Still others donate something from their very own system: their bodily fluids.
This is an amazing practice. Donating blood is an excellent way to help those in medical need. Plasma is a particularly strong gift during the pandemic because it contains your antibodies.
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Your plasma is the liquid part of your blood. It is responsible for carrying salt, water, and enzymes around your body. This fluid also transports the nutrients, proteins, and hormones your cells need to operate.
When you donate plasma after having the coronavirus, it is given via transfusion to someone who has a severe case of COVID-19. The antibodies you developed to fight off the virus can then get to work once more. In this way, donated plasma can help save the life of someone with severe COVID-19.
Money-Making Aims
So, what’s the problem? This all sounds wonderful, does it not? Yes, it is. But like many paths to “doing the right thing”, this one has also met with some unexpected challenges.
News reports are telling the story of Idaho university students who have actually been hoping to catch COVID-19. They have wanted to survive the ordeal, and sell their much-desired plasma afterwards. According to some news outlets, various students have “intentionally exposed themselves” to the novel coronavirus with this one, sole aim.
While it could seem relatively harmless to do so if you are a young, healthy individual, we all know that when it comes to COVID-19 there are no guarantees. Even young people die. In light of this, A statement made by Brigham Young University-Idaho has gone so far as to label this illness-seeking practice as “reckless”.
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The statement predicted that students deliberately trying to contract COVID-19 will inevitably lead to more deaths within the nearby community. This, of course, would pretty much defeat any altruistic goals of the students’ experiment, if they existed apart from any money-making dreams.
At the time of this writing, Idaho is seeing a surge in cases of COVID-19. It is the biggest growth in cases seen in the state since the beginning of the pandemic. Areas like Boise and Bannock are being hit the hardest with new case counts between 100 to 200 per day, according to the Mayo Clinic.
During the summer months, the US along with other countries, saw a dip in cases of COVID-19 but since the end of August, the virus has been on the rise again across the nation. At the time of this writing, 11 vaccines to treat the illness are in stage three of trials, but none have yet to be approved for use, apart from Russia’s controversial coronavirus vaccine being used inside its own country.
