Three new studies on steroids show that the inexpensive and widely available drug can help alleviate severe Covid-19 cases, according to a research published on Wednesday in the journal JAMA.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) supported the evidence provided by the three different research studies on steroids and strongly recommended doctors use steroids to treat critically-ill coronavirus patients.

WHO also wrote in the updated guideline that the use of steroids is not recommended for patients with mild symptoms.

One group was from France, another team of researchers was from Brazil, and the third was a researcher from the University of Pittsburgh.

The researches said that earlier the use of steroids to treat Covid-19 positive patients was not reliable. However, some doctors were still using steroids to treat particular types of comorbidities, including sepsis and acute respiratory distress syndrome.

While some doctors believe that steroids could help protect the immune system from an overreaction to an infection, others suggest that steroids could prevent the body from fighting the coronavirus effectively.

Dr Derek Angus, a critical care specialist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre, said in a statement: “Giving steroids to Covid-19 could have been quite scary.”

The publication of the findings “represents an important step forward in the treatment of patients with Covid-19,” Dr Hallie Prescott and Dr Todd Rice wrote in a JAMA editorial.

The findings provided support for the use of dexamethasone and hydrocortisone; both steroids.

“I think it’s good news to have a strong, clear signal on what is a widely available, inexpensive class of therapies,” one of the researchers said in the study.

He also contrasted these studies with others on Covid-19.

“It is reassuring that we can get randomised trials executed successfully and rapidly in the face of a pandemic and it definitely puts us on a surer footing,” the researcher further added.