Lilly Antibody Combo Therapy Reduced Viral Levels, Study Says

(Bloomberg) -- Eli Lilly and Co.’s combination antibody drug for Covid-19 outperformed one of its components that’s now being used for treatment on its own in reducing patients’ viral levels, according to a study.

Patients who received bamlanivimab alone, which is authorized for U.S. emergency use, didn’t have reductions in viral load compared to placebo, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Those who received bamlanivimab in combination with etesevimab, had a reduction that was significantly greater than those who got placebo.

The study also found no difference between the monotherapy and combination in outcomes like hospitalization and deaths of patients, a secondary finding of the trial. The clinical outcomes should be more important to doctors than the viral load finding, Lilly Chief Scientific Officer Dan Skovronsky said in an interview.

Concluding from the study that bamlanivimab shouldn’t be used as a monotherapy would be a misinterpretation, he said. “Doctors should be just as confident using mono as combo.”

While researchers are rushing to develop new drugs and policies for the public-health crisis, the understanding of both Covid-19 and therapies to prevent and treat it has been more slowly evolving.

Editors for the journal, which published the Lilly study on Thursday morning, wrote in a corresponding editor’s note that “these are not normal times.”

“Even though monoclonal antibodies likely improve clinical outcomes in selected patients, the studies needed to answer remaining questions on the utility of treatment (which patients can benefit and in what circumstance) are unlikely to become available in a timely manner,” they said.