Chronic myeloid leukemia management at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy. A campus CML survey

These results of our survey show that the incidence of COVID-19 infection has so far proven extremely low in CML patients treated with TKIs. These data are in line with what observed in adult patients with Ph+ acute lymphoblastic leukemia (Ph+ ALL) in Italy, where patients are induced with a TKI plus steroids and no systemic chemotherapy, and could continue to be managed even at the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak [4]. Taken together, the data gathered on over 7000 cases of CML and Ph+ ALL support a potential role of TKIs in protecting patients from COVID-19 infection. To con- clusively answer this question a randomized study (EudraCT 2020-001236-10) is verifying the effect of imatinib in pre- venting pulmonary vascular leak in patients with severe COVID-19 disease. Although the likelihood of developing a symptomatic COVID-19 infection in CML patients in Italy is close to zero and lower than that of the general population in Italy, the current pandemic emergency is, however, already negatively impacting on different aspects of the day-to-day management of patients, on disease monitoring and on treatment decisions, as well as on the enrollment in and compliance to clinical trials