MIAMI — Monoclonal antibody therapy sites to help COVID patients battle the virus could reopen across the state if they were to receive a drug that the Food and Drug Administration says is expected to work against the omicron variant.
Answering a reporter's question during a news conference Wednesday at Miami Dade College, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said "they don't give us enough" of the drug Sotrovimab. The FDA mentioned it among other therapies authorized or approved and believed to fight the omicron variant now believed to be most widespread across the country.
The federal agency on Monday announced it rescinded the emergency use authorization for two monoclonal antibody treatments — Bamlanivimab and Etesevimab administered together and REGEN-COV — produced by companies Regeneron and Eli Lilly. They remain authorized "only when the patient is likely to have been infected with or exposed to a variant that is susceptible to these treatments," the FDA said.
Since then, the governor has been a vocal opponent of the FDA's decision, vowing to "fight back" in some way to obtain a drug deemed ineffective. DeSantis and doctors assembled at the Miami news conference questioned why the decision was made based on a study they said wasn't properly peer-reviewed and not conducted with humans.
In a news release, the FDA says the National Institutes of Health's COVID-19 Guidelines Panel recently recommended against using the drugs as a treatment. It, too, mentioned drugs Paxlovid, Sotrovimab, Remdesivir and Molnupiravir should be effective against omicron.
Florida just isn't getting the supply right now, DeSantis said.
"If they would replace the Regeneron and the Eli Lilly with Sotrovimab, we would absolutely keep the sites open, 100 percent," the governor responded to a reporter.
"But I can't have people come up and not have the medication available for them, they're just not giving us nearly enough," he continued, referring to the thousands of monoclonal antibody therapy appointments that were canceled in the wake of the FDA's announcement.
"I would absolutely purchase more Sotrovimab to be able to keep the sites open," DeSantis said.
10 Tampa Bay has reached out to the Department of Health and Human Services about the governor's comments.
An HHS spokesperson told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the federal government continues to distribute a GlaxoSmithKline antibody and two antiviral pills that are effective against omicron. Supplies of those drugs are said to be limited.
"The Administration is focused on making sure that, if an American gets sick with COVID-19, they get a treatment that actually works," HHS' Kirsten Allen said in a statement.