Largest US Study of Health Care Workers Exposed to COVID-19 Launched

Researchers at Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ, USA) have launched the largest prospective study of health care workers exposed to COVID-19 in the US. The study includes a series of clinical trials that will explore new drug treatments, antibody testing, and long-term health tracking in the hope of providing insight into how to treat the disease and prevent its spread.

Close to 550 health care providers and close to 300 non-health care workers have volunteered for the study, some with direct patient exposure and others with no direct patient contact. The study will prospectively determine infection rates in the Rutgers workforce who regularly treat patients and for those without direct patient exposure by following the participants for six months. The point of the study is to determine the proportion of the workforce who will get infected. Such information is critically important in determining who gets infected and their susceptibility characteristics for infection. Separately, the trial will also determine whether some health care workers will develop immunity and, thus, could be first responders in the pandemic. Initial results suggest a gender disparity in risk: women have been infected at a rate of 13 times their male counterparts. Some of this may be attributed to the existing disparity in the nursing workforce, which currently includes more women than men.

The university has launched two clinical trials as part of the study. The first is for patients who test positive for COVID-19 and are symptomatic. They have been enrolled in a clinical to determine if azithromycin combined with hydroxychloroquine is better than hydroxychloroquine alone for treatment of patients with COVID-19. The second clinical trial will focus on those who test positive for COVID-19 but are asymptomatic. This will be a carefully controlled clinical trial to determine whether the viral infection can be decreased faster with hydroxychloroquine or with the combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin. This study will also determine whether prophylaxis with these drugs prevent symptom development. Azithromycin is approved by the FDA for the treatment of infections. Hydroxychloroquine is approved by the FDA for the treatment of malaria and autoimmune diseases, such as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis.

“Health care workers throughout the world are on the front lines of battling COVID-19,” said Brian Strom, Chancellor, Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences. “Our hope is that this study and other scientific developments can give state, national and global leaders the evidence-based tools to ultimately end this pandemic.”

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