US Buys Additional Doses of Eli Lilly's COVID-19 Therapy

Eli Lilly and Co. announced Wednesday the U.S. government bought 388,000 additional doses of its COVID-19 antibody therapy, etesevimab.

The drugmaker will supply additional doses of etesevimab to be paired with doses of its other COVID-19 antibody therapy, bamlanivimab, previously purchased by the U.S. government.

The news comes after Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc said late on Tuesday the U.S. government was buying 1.4 million additional doses of its COVID-19 antibody cocktail, REGEN-COV.

Lilly said its deal with the U.S government is expected to generate approximately $330 million in revenue in the second half of 2021, with about 200,000 doses expected to be shipped in the third quarter this year and the remaining in fourth.

"The recent increase in COVID-19 cases has caused a substantial rise in the utilization of monoclonal antibody drugs, particularly in areas of the country with low vaccination rates," Lilly's chief scientific and medical officer Daniel Skovronsky said.

The drugmaker will supply additional doses of etesevimab to be paired with doses of its other COVID-19 antibody therapy, bamlanivimab, previously purchased by the U.S. government.

Bamlanivimab and etesevimab are authorized for use in people 12 years and above with mild-to-moderate infection and at high risk for progression to severe COVID-19

Earlier this month, Newsmax reported that hospitalized COVID-19 patients died less often if they received Eli Lilly's rheumatoid arthritis drug baricitinib along with the other treatments their doctors had prescribed. Thomson Reuters based its report on a study published Wednesday in The Lancet Respiratory. The randomized trial involved 1,525 seriously ill patients, all of whom needed extra oxygen to help with breathing.

More than 90% were already receiving dexamethasone, a cheap generic steroid known to improve survival of critically ill COVID-19 patients. While baricitinib, sold under the brand name Olumiant, did not appear to keep patients from getting sicker, it did reduce their risk of dying.

The 28-day and 60-day death rates were 5% lower among patients randomly assigned to receive baricitinib instead of a placebo. Baricitinib is already approved in the United States for use in hospitalized COVID-19 patients in combination with Gilead Science's antiviral drug remdesivir. The two drugs together appear to have more benefit than remdesivir alone.

In the new study, more than 80% of participants were not receiving remdesivir, suggesting that baricitinib also "has synergistic effects with other standard-of-care treatments," including dexamethasone, researchers said.