Coronavirus COVID-19 - Global Health Pandemic #83

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I've been looking at the data on REGN-COV2. (Regeneron is not the name of a drug, it's the name of a pharm company). It would seem that all the studies were done on mild cases, ie not sick enough to be hospitalized, and is given via IV. In this very select population of patients, it does appear that an infusion of REGN-COV2 does decrease the total number of symptomatic days. The studies make no attempt, thus far, to assess the impact, if any, on mortality or death rates. I don't currently see any trials underway in sick, hospitalized patients.

While early results are encouraging, no studies have been done on sick, hospitalized patients. This implies the drug is given before patients are sick enough to be in the hospital. How is that going to work? Infuse the patient via IV in the doctor's office before they are sick enough to be at the hospital? Infuse them upon a positive test? This is similar to Tamiflu, used early to prevent full-blown infection. But that's easy; it's a pill.

I've looked all over for treatment guidelines regarding the timing/administration of REGN-COV2 and came up empty. Are most doctors offices even set up with staff and equipment to infuse IV meds? If not, who is going to pay to set them up?

So many questions.

Regeneron Covid-19 antibody may help speed recovery, early data show
 
CharlestonGal said:
I'm not sure what is going on. I'm keeping an eye out for some kind of press release or outline of the plan in the next few days. He most definitely said the treatment he received would be provided free to all Americans. Hopefully, the details will be provided soon. Covid is going to explode again over the coming winter, which has already started. We don't have a lot of time here.
Click to expand...

Ain't that the truth.

Report: Yellowstone County near hospital capacity as COVID cases rise
 
Sundog said:
I think we're having a national conversation on different models of health care, and we're trying to strike a balance between socialized medicine and yet the option for private care. Canada allows for both at this time, and this evolved, as I understand. The wealthy buy private plans, and many of them travel to the U.S. for specialized care. That is often because of the rationing that goes along with socialized health care. Each country has to decide the pros and cons of various systems of health care and decide the direction they want to go.

I think Canadians pay about $3,000 a year or so in taxes to be covered by socialized medicine, and will look for the study, I read it a few months ago. Will look for the link. Not sure about other countries, for example, the UK, maybe @tresir2012 can enlighten us. Will U.S. citizens agree to this cost? That is only one of the issues, of course.

Rationed health care for people who are used to having more choices in their health care will be hard for Americans to get used to. As I said, there are pros and cons. The people of each nation get to decide.
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Imo 'socialized medicine' is an opinion, not a thing. If people get over that thought, again imo, things would work out great for all US citizens.

I'm aware it's not appropriate for the Covid19 threads, so will not get into any back and forth, but the US has to go to Mars? The US has to be in various war torn countries (where you started the wars)? The US can't do away with only having insurance company healthcare coverage? And no imo, the US is not having a national conversation on healthcare - unless of course some links can be provided.

You can do it if you only all pull together and care about one another. This would be the time since the US has to re-evaluate just about everything right now.

And yes, Canadians do go to the US when something vital is not available to them in Canada. We get that sometimes we have to do that. $3,000 per year (if that is in fact the right number and not pulled out of the air) doesn't cover everything that can go wrong healthwise.

End of my participation so I don't have a timeout.
 
10ofRods said:
Great analysis - very worrying. I think it's the same in France (you really have to dig through their major newspapers to find meaningful CoVid information - although it looks like bad weather and bad news have combined to keep people out of Paris, a hot spot, and mask wearing seems to be around 80%).

Are people already spending more time indoors? Did indoor businesses reopen partially?
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10ofRods said:
Great analysis - very worrying. I think it's the same in France (you really have to dig through their major newspapers to find meaningful CoVid information - although it looks like bad weather and bad news have combined to keep people out of Paris, a hot spot, and mask wearing seems to be around 80%).

Are people already spending more time indoors? Did indoor businesses reopen partially?
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Yep. Colorado opened up pretty much everything (about the time they revamped the website). Restaurants have lower capacity limits but you can dine inside. People are supposed to wear masks when they aren’t actively eating/drinking but I hear many people just take them off when they sit down. Bars are open too as long as they also serve food. And as evidenced by my neighborhood dive bar, put a hot dog cart in the parking lot and you’re good to go. Nail and hair salons are open. Fitness centers, movie theaters, malls and casinos all open. Schools open. My 4 year old God Daughter plays pee-wee soccer every Saturday. (As if waiting till kids are 5 or 6 to start them in team sports will permanently stunt physical coordination and social skills).

There are mask ordinances but it’s up to business owners to enforce them. No mystery at all why the trend is going back up. It would boggle my mind if it didn’t.
 
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As an Australian I see many misrepresentations regarding universal healthcare, most notably what isn’t realized is that universal healthcare is fiscally conservative. There is no middleman - aka the insurance companies - who need to make $$. Money is pooled into Medicare which gives greater buying power and costs of treatments and medication is therefore kept low. There’s no rationing and there’s no waiting for approval from an insurance company for treatment. If your doctor prescribes it, you get it.

You can have private insurance if you’d like a plush private room in a private hospital, but the standard of medical care is the same. Most doctors work both public and private, you’re not going to get a “better” doctor. Private insurance can help with getting elective surgeries quicker, like knee surgery, but no one public or private is going to be waiting for cancer treatment.

Another misconception I sometimes see is people thinking doctors are “government doctors” like North Korea or something. Our doctors are private citizens and generally wealthy and often drive Mercedes and have houses on the water. We have world class doctors and scientists and many procedures, vaccinations and treatments you all may use are pioneered right here in Australia from cancer treatments to IVF to gardasil.

I earn over $100k and my Medicare levy is about $2500 a year paid as tax. No more to pay, no monthly insurance payments unless by choice (and there’s tax incentives for having it). Six months in the ICU will cost me $0.

It’s not just a compassionate stance, it is the most financially sensible all around. In addition to making the most financial sense like pooling money/buying power, a healthy population benefits the economy. A healthy person can work, spend money, and pay tax. Since one never has to question whether they can afford to see a doctor, preventative care is high.
 
Tigerlily75 said:
As an Australian I see many misrepresentations regarding universal healthcare, most notably what isn’t realized is that universal healthcare is fiscally conservative. There is no middleman - aka the insurance companies - who need to make $$. Money is pooled into Medicare which gives greater buying power and costs of treatments and medication is therefore kept low. There’s no rationing and there’s no waiting for approval from an insurance company for treatment. If your doctor prescribes it, you get it.

You can have private insurance if you’d like a plush private room in a private hospital, but the standard of medical care is the same. Most doctors work both public and private, you’re not going to get a “better” doctor. Private insurance can help with getting elective surgeries quicker, like knee surgery, but no one public or private is going to be waiting for cancer treatment.

Another misconception I sometimes see is people thinking doctors are “government doctors” like North Korea or something. Our doctors are private citizens and generally wealthy and often drive Mercedes and have houses on the water. We have world class doctors and scientists and many procedures, vaccinations and treatments you all may use are pioneered right here in Australia from cancer treatments to IVF to gardasil.

I earn over $100k and my Medicare levy is about $2500 a year paid as tax. No more to pay, no monthly insurance payments unless by choice (and there’s tax incentives for having it). Six months in the ICU will cost me $0.

It’s not just a compassionate stance, it is the most financially sensible all around. In addition to making the most financial sense like pooling money/buying power, a healthy population benefits the economy. A healthy person can work, spend money, and pay tax. Since one never has to question whether they can afford to see a doctor, preventative care is high.
Click to expand...
Thank you for this post. It’s possibly the most straightforward description/rationale for universal health I’ve seen anyplace ever.
 
President Trump is planning to host hundreds of people on the South Lawn of the White House on Saturday for his first in-person event since he announced he had tested positive for the coronavirus, three people familiar with the plans said on Friday.

The president was expected to make remarks from one of the balconies at the White House to the crowd, which was expected to include people attending an event elsewhere in Washington staged by a Trump supporter, Candace Owens, one of the people familiar with the plans said. The event, which was first reported by ABC News, continues Mr. Trump’s pattern of using the White House for political events, as he did with his Republican National Convention speech.

2020 Election Live Updates: Kept Home by the Coronavirus, Trump Plans Rally for Hundreds Outside White House
 
Tigerlily75 said:
As an Australian I see many misrepresentations regarding universal healthcare, most notably what isn’t realized is that universal healthcare is fiscally conservative. There is no middleman - aka the insurance companies - who need to make $$. Money is pooled into Medicare which gives greater buying power and costs of treatments and medication is therefore kept low. There’s no rationing and there’s no waiting for approval from an insurance company for treatment. If your doctor prescribes it, you get it.

You can have private insurance if you’d like a plush private room in a private hospital, but the standard of medical care is the same. Most doctors work both public and private, you’re not going to get a “better” doctor. Private insurance can help with getting elective surgeries quicker, like knee surgery, but no one public or private is going to be waiting for cancer treatment.

Another misconception I sometimes see is people thinking doctors are “government doctors” like North Korea or something. Our doctors are private citizens and generally wealthy and often drive Mercedes and have houses on the water. We have world class doctors and scientists and many procedures, vaccinations and treatments you all may use are pioneered right here in Australia from cancer treatments to IVF to gardasil.

I earn over $100k and my Medicare levy is about $2500 a year paid as tax. No more to pay, no monthly insurance payments unless by choice (and there’s tax incentives for having it). Six months in the ICU will cost me $0.

It’s not just a compassionate stance, it is the most financially sensible all around. In addition to making the most financial sense like pooling money/buying power, a healthy population benefits the economy. A healthy person can work, spend money, and pay tax. Since one never has to question whether they can afford to see a doctor, preventative care is high.
Click to expand...
Wow. That is awesome. I have the BEST health insurance you can buy in the US and 6 months of ICU care would still cost me an insane amount of money. To add insult to injury, the premiums cost more than twice your quote of $2500 a year.

Damn. I live in the wrong country.:(
 
CharlestonGal said:
I've been looking at the data on REGN-COV2. (Regeneron is not the name of a drug, it's the name of a pharm company). It would seem that all the studies were done on mild cases, ie not sick enough to be hospitalized, and is given via IV. In this very select population of patients, it does appear that an infusion of REGN-COV2 does decrease the total number of symptomatic days. The studies make no attempt, thus far, to assess the impact, if any, on mortality or death rates. I don't currently see any trials underway in sick, hospitalized patients.

While early results are encouraging, no studies have been done on sick, hospitalized patients. This implies the drug is given before patients are sick enough to be in the hospital. How is that going to work? Infuse the patient via IV in the doctor's office before they are sick enough to be at the hospital? Infuse them upon a positive test? This is similar to Tamiflu, used early to prevent full-blown infection. But that's easy; it's a pill.

I've looked all over for treatment guidelines regarding the timing/administration of REGN-COV2 and came up empty. Are most doctors offices even set up with staff and equipment to infuse IV meds? If not, who is going to pay to set them up?

So many questions.

Regeneron Covid-19 antibody may help speed recovery, early data show
Click to expand...

Excellent questions. I guess the drug doesn't have a common name yet - as it's not FDA approved?

Very interesting points about REGN-COV2, as it would be unusable (by cost and by practicality) to the American people with mild symptoms.

I do wonder if they gave him all the meds at more or less the same time (it seems that they did). Or did the anti-viral and steroid first? At any rate, it sounds like it might be the psychological phenom (flight to health) that is observed in many patients once they are given a treatment. It is impossible to know which of the drugs administered to the president worked (or if all of them did) because it isn't a controlled study.

But it is a good ad for the Regn monoclonal antibody. Also helps if the CEO of the company is a member of your golf club:

Regeneron CEO is a member of Trump's golf club | Daily Mail Online
 
Lilibet said:
President Trump is planning to host hundreds of people on the South Lawn of the White House on Saturday for his first in-person event since he announced he had tested positive for the coronavirus, three people familiar with the plans said on Friday.

The president was expected to make remarks from one of the balconies at the White House to the crowd, which was expected to include people attending an event elsewhere in Washington staged by a Trump supporter, Candace Owens, one of the people familiar with the plans said. The event, which was first reported by ABC News, continues Mr. Trump’s pattern of using the White House for political events, as he did with his Republican National Convention speech.

2020 Election Live Updates: Kept Home by the Coronavirus, Trump Plans Rally for Hundreds Outside White House
Click to expand...

Thank you - so this is a different event than on the mall. Obviously, it will have tight security and, I would think, not that many participants. (Not thousands)
 
Same in the UK, consultants work both private and nhs, my employer offers private cover but I'm declining it. As a benefit you pay tax on it and gain little because NHS targets (well, normally) mean that if you have suspected cancer for instance, you must have scans etc within a certain timeframe.
 
CharlestonGal said:
Wow. That is awesome. I have the BEST health insurance you can buy in the US and 6 months of ICU care would still cost me an insane amount of money. To add insult to injury, the premiums cost more than twice your quote of $2500 a year.

Damn. I live in the wrong country.:(
Click to expand...

Exactly. My husband and I pay $13,000/year for our very, very, very good insurance. And that's half of the actual premium - the other half is paid by the government, as my husband retired from there. Last year, I waited 8 months for back surgery that I wasn't eligible for 10 years ago regardless of the fact that I always hurt, because I finally hit the right kind of hurt for insurance to pay for it. The 8 months was because insurance required I go through three different options to prove none of the worked, even though the doctor told me that they wouldn't work. I had out-of-pocket expenses that most couldn't pay, even if they could afford the premium.
 
Knitty said:
Exactly. My husband and I pay $13,000/year for our very, very, very good insurance. And that's half of the actual premium - the other half is paid by the government, as my husband retired from there. Last year, I waited 8 months for back surgery that I wasn't eligible for 10 years ago regardless of the fact that I always hurt, because I finally hit the right kind of hurt for insurance to pay for it. The 8 months was because insurance required I go through three different options to prove none of the worked, even though the doctor told me that they wouldn't work. I had out-of-pocket expenses that most couldn't pay, even if they could afford the premium.
Click to expand...
I hear you. Even after paying thousands of dollars in premiums, you still have to BEG them for care. And they have loophole after loophole to jump through to continue to deny you the care you pay for!

I honestly think that part of our covid death rate can directly be attributed to people who don't seek medical care early enough because they simply can't afford it. Even with private insurance.

For a supposed first world country our healthcare is abominable.
 
CharlestonGal said:
I've been looking at the data on REGN-COV2. (Regeneron is not the name of a drug, it's the name of a pharm company). It would seem that all the studies were done on mild cases, ie not sick enough to be hospitalized, and is given via IV. In this very select population of patients, it does appear that an infusion of REGN-COV2 does decrease the total number of symptomatic days. The studies make no attempt, thus far, to assess the impact, if any, on mortality or death rates. I don't currently see any trials underway in sick, hospitalized patients.

While early results are encouraging, no studies have been done on sick, hospitalized patients. This implies the drug is given before patients are sick enough to be in the hospital. How is that going to work? Infuse the patient via IV in the doctor's office before they are sick enough to be at the hospital? Infuse them upon a positive test? This is similar to Tamiflu, used early to prevent full-blown infection. But that's easy; it's a pill.

I've looked all over for treatment guidelines regarding the timing/administration of REGN-COV2 and came up empty. Are most doctors offices even set up with staff and equipment to infuse IV meds? If not, who is going to pay to set them up?

So many questions.

Regeneron Covid-19 antibody may help speed recovery, early data show
Click to expand...



REGN-COV2 is being studied in four ongoing late-stage clinical trials: two Phase 2/3 trials for the treatment of hospitalized and non-hospitalized (“ambulatory”) COVID-19 patients, the open-label, Phase 3 RECOVERY trial of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in the UK, and a Phase 3 trial for the prevention of COVID-19 in uninfected people who are at high-risk of exposure to a COVID-19 patient (such as the patient’s housemate). The Phase 3 prevention trial is being jointly conducted with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The safety of REGN-COV2 is also being evaluated in a Phase 1 healthy volunteer study.

Regeneron’s COVID-19 Response Efforts
 
CSIDreamer said:
Really great news!
Click to expand...
Here's details of the US trials with results.

Regeneron's REGN-COV2 Antibody Cocktail Reduced Viral Levels and Improved Symptoms in Non-Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients | Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc.

This is interesting

"Additional Trial Background
Among the first 275 patients, approximately 56% were Hispanic, 13% were African Americanand 64% had one or more underlying risk factors for severe COVID-19, including obesity (more than 40%). On average, patients were 44 years of age. In total, 49% of participants were male and 51% were female.

At least 1,300 patients will be recruited into the Phase 2/3 portion of the outpatient trial overall. Patients will be followed for 29 days, with viral shedding in the upper respiratory tract assessed approximately every 2-3 days in the Phase 2 portion of the trial and clinical endpoints assessed via investigator and patient-reported data throughout.

In addition to this trial in non-hospitalized patients, REGN-COV2 is currently being studied in a Phase 2/3 clinical trial for the treatment of COVID-19 in hospitalized patients, the Phase 3 open-label RECOVERY trial of hospitalized patients in the UK and a Phase 3 trial for the prevention of COVID-19 in household contacts of infected individuals. Recruitment in all 4 trials is ongoing.

Investor and Media Webcast Information
Regeneron will host a conference call and simultaneous webcast to share updates on REGN-COV2 today September 29, 2020 at 4:30 pm ET. To access the call, dial (888) 660-6127 (U.S.) or (973) 890-8355 (International). A link to the webcast may be accessed from the "Investors and Media" page of Regeneron's website at www.regeneron.com. A replay of the conference call and webcast will be archived on the Company's website and will be available for at least 30 days.

About REGN-COV2
REGN-COV2 is a combination of two monoclonal antibodies (REGN10933 and REGN10987) and was designed specifically to block infectivity of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

To develop REGN-COV2, Regeneron scientists evaluated thousands of fully-human antibodies produced by the company's VelocImmune® mice, which have been genetically modified to have a human immune system, as well as antibodies identified from humans who have recovered from COVID-19. The two potent, virus-neutralizing antibodies that form REGN-COV2 bind non-competitively to the critical receptor binding domain of the virus's spike protein, which diminishes the ability of mutant viruses to escape treatment and protects against spike variants that have arisen in the human population, as detailed in Science. Preclinical studies have shown that REGN-COV2 reduced the amount of virus and associated damage in the lungs of non-human primates."
 
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