Regeneron Pharmaceuticals announced Tuesday that its COVID-19 antibody treatment has been proven in a clinical trial to greatly reduce the risk of hospitalization or death in patients who test positive for the virus.
The company announced on its website that a study of more than 4,500 patients found that treatment with Regeneron reduced both risks by 70 percent.
According to the company’s findings, the drug cocktail was also effective in shortening recovery time from two weeks to 10 days.
All 4,567 patients involved in Regeneron’s study had at least one risk factor, according to the company’s website, that put them at increased risk of hospitalization or death from the disease, such as obesity or heart disease.
“With approximately 60,000 newly diagnosed in the US every day and 40,000 still in the hospital because of COVID-19, we are committed to working with the government, health care providers and others to achieve rapid and widespread adoption of REGEN-COV in suitable patients. ‘,’ Said Regeneron president George Yancopoulos, in a press release.
“These encouraging results confirm the rapid and significant antiviral effects of REGEN-COV, even at much lower and subcutaneous doses,” said David Weinreich, global clinical development director at Regeneron.
The news of the effectiveness of Regeneron’s treatment comes several months after Eli Lilly announced that his own antibody treatment had proven significantly effective in preventing the spread of COVID-19 among staff and residents of nursing homes where the drug was being tested.
The US reported 650 deaths from COVID-19 and more than 55,000 new infections on Monday.