A slew of "gold standard" clinical trials offer new hope for patients battling severe COVID-19: cheap, common drugs known as corticosteroids appear to cut the death rate by a third.

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Publication of new data on treatment with corticosteroids such as hydrocortisone or dexamethasone "represents an important step forward in the treatment of patients with COVID-19," said Dr. Hallie Prescott of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and Dr. Todd Rice, of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.

They wrote an editorial accompanying four studies on corticosteroids and COVID-19, all published online Sept. 2 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).