The Effects of Immunomodulators on a Veteran Population During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the Novel Coronavirus Disease, COVID-19, a pandemic on March 11, 2020. The VA New York Harbor Healthcare System (NYHHS), a designated COVID hospital, provides a heterogenous make-up of the Veteran population in terms of age, gender and ethnicity and was studied to gain insight into the effects of COVID-19 with and without prior exposure to immunomodulating agents. The severe acute respiratory syndrome caused by COVID-19 remains the focus of discovering effective treatment options in order to slow disease progression as well as decrease mortality. The severe acute respiratory syndrome caused by COVID-19 remains the focus of discovering effective treatment options in order to slow disease progression as well as decrease mortality. Due to the urgent need to develop therapeutic options to treat this disease, the repurposing of currently FDA approved drugs have become the focus. Immunomodulating agents have been among the pharmacological treatments of cytokine storm. Our study is a retrospective chart review of data was collected from October 1st, 2019 to February 28th, 2020 to identify Veterans with currently active prescriptions for immunomodulating medications for non-COVID-19 related conditions, per the American Rheumatological Society guidelines. Results suggest the link between immunocytokines and the host response to viral infections makes the use of immunomodulators a treatment strategy worth considering.Funding Statement: None to declare.Declaration of Interests: None to declare.Ethics Approval Statement: This study was approved by the ethics committee at the VA NY Harbor Health System, Brooklyn Campus.