New Covid Treatments Are Here, But Who Gets Them?
Inequality and poor planning have marred the U.S. response to Covid-19. The same can't happen for new therapies like the one just approved from Eli Lilly.
There will be far too many people lining up for far too few doses of new Covid-19 treatments.
Photographer: Willowpix/iStockphotoWhen it rains good pandemic news, it pours. On a Monday that brought unexpectedly positive vaccine news from Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE, the Food and Drug Administration also granted emergency use authorization to an Eli Lilly & Co. drug for treatment of individuals newly infected with the coronavirus. It's the first to be approved of a promising group of therapies called monoclonal antibodies that mimic the body’s response to infection, and could be a powerful weapon in the pandemic fight.
Some questions remain about Lilly's treatment, called bamlanivimab, which was found to reduce the viral load in patients and may help keep people out of the hospital. It was authorized for treatment at a dose that didn't produce a statistically significant effect in published data, and there's some concern that resistant mutant strains might develop. But with the drug now authorized, the crucial question is who will get access to a highly limited supply.