DeSantis acquires new COVID antibody treatment
Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday the state will be receiving 3,000 doses of the monoclonal antibody COVID treatment sotrovimab to make up for reduced supplies of the one manufactured by Regeneron.
But he once again did not correct a false claim from someone speaking at one of his news conferences, this time a Tampa-area resident who said the horse deworming drug Ivermectin works as a COVID treatment.
In Tampa, DeSantis blamed the Biden administration for reduced shipments of the monoclonal antibody treatment Regeneron, saying, “we had supplies of 40,000 to 45,000 doses a week just a few weeks ago, we’re now less than 18,000 doses of Regeneron.”
Last week, the Department of Health and Human Services capped the supply of the COVID-19 treatment delivered directly to individual states as demand soared amid the delta surge, with Florida’s weekly supply set at 30,950 doses.
The federal cap was part of an overall increase of weekly shipments nationally from 100,000 to 150,000, but Florida and six other Southern states hit hard by the delta wave made up more than 70% of all previous shipments and are now receiving fewer doses.
Florida’s state clinics and private providers had been ordering about 72,000 doses a week, and the governor’s office has said about 36,000 doses are required weekly to supply the 25 clinics set up by the state.
About 90,000 doses had been administered as of last week, the governor’s office said. At an estimated cost of $2,100 per treatment, that amounts to $189 million.
Sotrovimab, manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline, is another monoclonal treatment that has received emergency approval from the Food and Drug Administration to treat COVID.
“The clinical data that they had was really, really strong,” DeSantis said. “In fact, it was even stronger than Regeneron. And we know Regeneron has been very, very effective in real-world [use].”
DeSantis was criticized last week for not correcting a Gainesville city employee who falsely claimed the vaccine “changes your RNA,” even though he was standing next to him and appeared to react to the statement by looking down. DeSantis later denied hearing the remarks.
On Thursday, Charles Craig, a 62-yearold Regeneron patient, falsely claimed, “In the beginning, hydroxychloroquine worked, they grabbed it. More recently, Invermectin worked and they grabbed it, and now they’re grabbing my Regeneron.”
Studies have shown hydroxychloroquine, once pushed by DeSantis and former president Donald Trump and still suggested as a treatment as recently as last week by DeSantis’ new state Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, is not effective in treating COVID19.
Invermectin is not effective at all and could cause poisoning.
“You are not a horse,” the FDA said in a tweet last month.