FDA au­tho­rizes Vir-GSK an­ti­body as vari­ants threat­en Eli Lil­ly mAb

The FDA has au­tho­rized the Covid-19 mon­o­clon­al an­ti­body treat­ment from Vir and Glax­o­SmithK­line, adding an­oth­er po­tent treat­ment op­tion as the pan­dem­ic con­tin­ues to rage in many cor­ners of the world and as new vari­ants threat­en to ren­der one of two ri­val ap­proach­es ob­so­lete.

The EUA comes af­ter Vir’s an­ti­body proved 85% ef­fec­tive at pre­vent­ing hos­pi­tal­iza­tion in high-risk, new­ly di­ag­nosed Covid-19 pa­tients — num­bers that ri­val or ex­ceed those post­ed in piv­otal tri­als by the an­ti­body com­bos from Re­gen­eron and Eli Lil­ly. Lil­ly’s com­bo, though, has al­ready been tak­en out of use in two states, Illi­nois and Mass­a­chu­setts, as it proved in­ef­fec­tive again a new vari­ant. On Wednes­day, it was paused in six oth­er states: Ari­zona, Cal­i­for­nia, Flori­da, In­di­ana, Ore­gon and Wash­ing­ton.

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