Coronavirus: Sotrovimab Neutralizing Antibody Protects Patients from Severe Disease |

The COVID-19 pandemic is ongoing worldwide and the increase in cases is expected to increase the pressure on health systems as the number of COVID-19 patients treated increases. Sotrovimab is a monoclonal antibody that neutralizes SARS-CoV-2 as well as many other sorbekoviruses.

The Doctors of the Therapeutic Clinic of the Medical School of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens Theodora Psaltopoulou, Giannis Danasis, Panos Malandrakis and Thanos Dimopoulos (Rector of EKPA) summarize the results of the study of Anil Gupta and associates published recently (27) The New England Journal of Medicine “Early Treatment for Covid-19 with SARS-CoV-2 Neutralizing Antibody Sotrovimab”.

This is a multicenter, double-blind phase 3 study involving patients with COVID-19 symptomatic disease who did not require hospitalization but with risk factors for severe disease and had symptoms for less than 5 days. Patients were randomized to a 1: 1 ratio to receive a 500 mg sotrovimab infusion or placebo. Participants were monitored for 29 days from inclusion in the study and hospitalizations and deaths for any cause were evaluated. The researchers analyzed data from 583 patients, of whom 291 received sotrovimab and 292 received placebo. 3 patients with COVID-19 (1%) from the group receiving sotrovimab in contrast to 21 patients with COVID-19 (7%) from the group receiving placebo had to be hospitalized or died (relative risk reduction of 85% with sotrovimab).

Among the placebo-treated patients, 5 patients were admitted to the intensive care unit and 1 was completed by the 29th day of study enrollment. Regarding drug safety, the data concern 868 patients in the study (430 in the sotrovimab group and 438 in the placebo group). Adverse reactions were reported in 17% of patients receiving sotrovimab and 19% of placebo.

In conclusion, high-risk patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 disease who received sotrovimab out of hospital were less likely to have the disease worsened, and no drug safety issues were identified.