While several anti-Covid treatments have been withdrawn from the market for lack of effectiveness since the arrival of the Omicron variant, a new drug, Xevudy, has been approved by the French health authorities, who consider it promising.
The High Authority for Health (HAS) "allows early access to a new curative treatment, GSK's Xevudy," said this body in a press release.
This medication is intended for people over 12 years of age who have just been infected with the coronavirus and are considered at risk of severe form.
“It is recommended to be administered within five days of the onset of symptoms”, specifies the authority.
The HAS authorizes the use of Xevudy (sotrovimab), a monoclonal antibody which would remain effective against the #Omicron variant (unlike the others), in people at risk of severe form of # Covid19.https: //t.co / 1objEXAdfc pic.twitter.com/Rdx9GhSwqp
- Nicolas Berrod (@nicolasberrod) January 7, 2022
Xevudy is administered intravenously.
It is part of the synthetic antibody treatments, several of which have already been authorized since the start of the pandemic.
But the arrival of the Omicron variant, more resistant to vaccines and other drugs, has made some of these treatments obsolete.
Read alsoCovid-19: "Antiviral treatments are almost all ineffective against Omicron"
The French health authorities thus stopped recommending Ronapreve from Roche in early January in the event of infection with Omicron, even if it remains authorized against Delta, the previous dominant variant.
Worse, they completely withdrew Eli Lilly's bamlanivimab / etesivimab combination from circulation, and its results were also disappointing against Delta.
Effective on Omicron
But unlike these two treatments, Xevudy "presents a mechanism of action which makes it possible to hope for the maintenance of its effectiveness on the variants, including the Omicron variant", explains the HAS. "In vitro data suggest that the neutralizing activity of sotrovimab is maintained when that of other available monoclonal antibodies decreases or even disappears", she explains.
Based on the sotrovimab molecule, it will therefore be, for the time being, the only antibody treatment that can be used after a proven infection with Omicron. Because the other treatment of this type, Evusheld from AstraZeneca, also considered effective against Omicron, is given preventively, especially in people whose body is resistant to vaccination.
