As COVID hospitalizations soar, DeSantis touts new monoclonal antibody treatment site
With some Florida hospitals overwhelmed by record numbers of COVID-19 patients and new cases still on the rise, Gov. Ron DeSantis visited one of the state’s hardest hit regions on Wednesday to announce the opening of a new site for providing the only treatment designed to keep infected people out of the hospital — monoclonal antibodies.
The new monoclonal antibody treatment site at C.B. Smith Park in Pembroke Pines is across the street from Memorial Hospital West, one of six public hospitals in South Broward that altogether had 713 COVID-positive inpatients on Wednesday, more than at any other time during the 18-month-long pandemic.
DeSantis acknowledged that the vast majority of people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Florida are not vaccinated, but he added that they also haven’t received monoclonal antibody therapy.
“I’d say throughout the state of Florida, at least 90% of everyone who’s admitted to hospitals for COVID did not get the monoclonal antibody treatment prior to being admitted,” he said.
The Pembroke Pines site is the fourth state-run operation in Florida to offer monoclonal antibody therapy. Others have opened in Jacksonville, Orlando and Merritt Island. New sites are scheduled to open this week in Miami-Dade and Palm Beach.
DeSantis said there will be 15 to 20 state-run sites providing up to 300 monoclonal antibody treatments a day in Florida over the coming weeks, and he expects them to make a dent in the number of people being hospitalized for COVID-19.
“If you do get infected,” he said, “whether you’re vaccinated or not, clinical data and real world data shows that if you avail yourself of the monoclonal antibody treatment at the appropriate time you will reduce your chance of being hospitalized by about 70%.”
Though the Food and Drug Administration first approved monoclonal antibody therapies for COVID-19 in November — and Florida hospitals have been offering the treatment ever since — the governor said that, “There’s not enough people that know about it.”
Treatment is limited in scope
But even with a higher profile for monoclonal antibodies, the number of people likely to benefit from the therapy is likely to be limited.
Monoclonal antibodies have not been shown to benefit infected persons once they are hospitalized, according to the initial FDA authorization, and in fact the therapy could worsen the condition of patients who are receiving high-flow oxygen or are on a ventilator.
The therapy works best when given within 10 days of initial symptoms — a time when many people are still trying to recover at home — and it is indicated for those at high risk of progressing to severe disease, which is often determined by other underlying medical conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes, morbid obesity and kidney failure.
Another limiting factor is that only one monoclonal antibody therapy — the treatment manufactured by the biotechnology company Regeneron — has been found effective against the more contagious delta variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 and that is now the predominant strain circulating in South Florida and much of the United States. A second monoclonal antibody treatment is made by the pharmaceutical company, Eli Lilly.
Olivier Schwartz, head of the virus and immunity unit for the Pasteur Institute in France, co-authored a recent study published in the journal, Nature, which found that one of the two monoclonal antibodies in the Eli Lilly therapy did not neutralize the delta variant.
Schwartz said in an email that the delta variant carries a mutation in the so-called spike protein that prevents the antibody, known as bamlanivimab, from binding to the virus and neutralizing it.
“Bamlanivimab is useless against variant delta,” Schwartz said.
On July 30, the FDA revised its approval for Regeneron and expanded its authorized use to include adults and children who are at risk of developing severe illness after exposure to the virus, whether or not they are vaccinated.
Beneficial for high-risk patients
The FDA emphasized that the expanded authorization meant the therapy could be used to prevent severe illness in high-risk individuals but not to protect against infection with COVID-19. Monoclonal antibodies are not a substitute for the three vaccines, which first received approval in December and remain the only medical intervention capable of preventing infection with the virus that causes COVID-19.
Floridians seeking monoclonal antibody therapy at one of the state-run sites will need to meet the criteria for high-risk patients but otherwise will not need a prescription to receive the treatment. DeSantis said a standing order signed by the Florida surgeon general allows patients to receive the treatment without a prescription if administered by a licensed healthcare professional.
Doctor referrals are not required at the state-run sites, and all of them will offer monoclonal antibody therapy for free. DeSantis emphasized that the therapy is provided at no cost, saying that those who claim otherwise have ulterior motives.
“That is a lie that is being disseminated for political purposes to try to dissuade people from seeking lifesaving treatment,” he said.
South Florida hospitals have been providing monoclonal antibody treatment since at least December. Yanet Obarrio, a spokeswoman for Memorial Healthcare System in South Broward said the hospital network began providing the therapy on Dec. 7 and moved the operation to a larger space to accommodate more patients.
Over the past month, as the pandemic has surged in Florida, the total number of monoclonal antibody treatments administered by Memorial Health has more than doubled — from 819 as of July 13 to a total of 1,973 as of Wednesday.
At Broward Health, the public hospital system for North Broward, doctors have been treating more patients with monoclonal antibody therapy over the past month as the pandemic has surged, said Dr. Joshua Lenchus, chief medical officer.
“We have over the last several weeks increased our capacity in an effort to address the crunch on our emergency room while at the same time identifying patients who are appropriate candidates for that therapy,” he said.
Lenchus said Broward Health has set up a separate facility where patients can drive up and get monoclonal antibody therapy without ever having to walk through the hospital campus. In the past 10 days, Lenchus said, Broward Health has administered about 100 treatments.
He said the therapy is highly effective when administered early in the course of the disease.
“It really jump starts the immune system,” he said. “The people that have received it by and large, after about 24 hours or so, feel completely different than when they were walking in. In fact some people get up after the half hour infusion is done and they feel completely different, almost like we gave them an infusion of a new life force.”
But Lenchus emphasized that the vast majority of people hospitalized with COVID-19 are not vaccinated, and that the monoclonal antibodies are not for everybody who gets infected.
“This is a treatment option for a select group of patients,” he said, “who may develop COVID but not be sick enough to be hospitalized.”
Miami Herald staff writer Ben Conarck contributed to this report.
This story was originally published August 18, 2021 at 5:59 PM.
