Lilly’s Covid-19 combo is better at low doses

A new cut of data from the Blaze-1 study of Lilly’s Covid-19 MAb combo has posted even better data than a prior cut looking at higher doses. This is good news as the dose involved in the latest analysis, 700mg of bamlanivimab and 1,400mg of etesevimab, is the one authorised by the US FDA. In a 769-strong cohort of high-risk patients aged 12 and older with mild to moderate Covid-19 the lower-dose combo provided an 87% reduction in risk of hospitalisation or death versus placebo. This improves on the data from a different cohort in the phase III part of the trial released in January with a 2,800mg dose of each antibody. The four deaths in the new cut all occurred in the placebo arm, meaning that so far in Blaze-1 no patient given the MAb combo has died, whereas 13 of the total 14 deaths in placebo patients in the trial have been deemed Covid-19-related. The FDA granted emergency use authorisation for the new regimen in February, but the sellside sees competition for Lilly’s MAbs in the shape of Regeneron’s REGN-COV, Evaluate Pharma consensus forecasts show.