REgeneron said Tuesday that his cocktail of monoclonal antibodies avoided Covid-19 in a clinical trial.
The news, released in a press release, mirrored similar news from Eli Lilly last week that her monoclonal antibody prevented symptomatic infections by Covid-19 in nursing homes.
The results represent the first 400 volunteers in the study, which is being carried out by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), and continues to enroll patients. The volunteers were at high risk of infection because they lived in the same house as a patient at Covid-19. Half of the patients received a placebo and the other half received 1.2 grams of casirivimab and imdevimab, antibodies from Regeneron.
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While eight of the 223 patients in the placebo group developed Covid’s symptoms and tested positive for the virus, none of the 186 patients who received the antibody did so. Volunteers who received the antibody were also less likely to be asymptomatic carriers of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes Covid-19. Twenty-three volunteers in the placebo group tested positive for the virus, compared with 10 in the antibody group, a 50% reduction.
It also appeared that infections in volunteers who received the antibody were less severe than those who did not, the company said. The volunteers infected in the placebo group had, on average, peak viral loads more than 100 times higher. Infections in the antibody group did not last more than a week, while 40% of infections in the placebo group lasted three to four weeks.
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Adverse events were less common among those who received the antibody cocktail, occurring in 18% in the placebo group and 12% in the antibody group. This was the result of the negative effects of the virus. Two percent of people in both groups had reactions at the injection site.
George Yancopoulos, scientific director at Regeneron, said in a statement that even with the vaccines available, the antibody will be able to help break the chain of infection and may be useful for immunocompromised individuals or those unable to be vaccinated.
Regeneron was able to formulate the antibody so that it could be administered as an injection, instead of being administered intravenously. This would make the antibody much easier for healthcare professionals to administer.
The results were not peer-reviewed or published in an academic journal.