Eli Lilly and Company has announced the start of human testing in the "world's first study of a potential antibody treatment designed to fight COVID-19."
The company on Monday said the first patients have been dosed as it tests a potential antibody treatment for COVID-19 in what Stat News described as a "milestone." Eli Lilly touted this as the "first potential new medicine specifically designed to attack" the coronavirus. The study will focus on determining the drug's safety in patients hospitalized with COVID-19, and the company is expecting results by the end of June; it then aims to test among non-hospitalized patients.
"Ultimately, what we would hope is that this would be an effective treatment that would provide very strongly neutralizing antibodies to lower the virus and help patients recover," Mark Mulligan, who is working on the study, told Stat News.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The company also looks to determine whether the drug can be used for prevention, which The Wall Street Journal notes is an "approach that could serve as a bridge toward curbing the pandemic until a successful vaccine is developed." According to Stat News, the study "will only test the drug for obvious side effects," and it will be given to 32 patients.
If this potential treatment "becomes part of the near-term solution for COVID-19," president of Lilly Research Laboratories Daniel Skovronsky said in a statement, "we want to be ready to deliver it to patients as quickly as possible, with the goal of having several hundred thousand doses available by the end of the year." Skovronsky also told Stat News, "I hope there will be multiple successful [antibody drugs]. I expect there will be."
-
September 14 editorial cartoonsCartoons Sunday’s political cartoons include RFK Jr on the hook, the destruction of discourse, and more
-
Air strikes in the Caribbean: Trump’s murky narco-warTalking Point Drug cartels ‘don’t follow Marquess of Queensberry Rules’, but US military air strikes on speedboats rely on strained interpretation of ‘invasion’
-
Crossword: September 14, 2025The Week's daily crossword puzzle
-
Florida erases rainbow crosswalk at Pulse nightclubSpeed Read The colorful crosswalk was outside the former LGBTQ nightclub where 49 people were killed in a 2016 shooting
-
Trump says Smithsonian too focused on slavery's illsSpeed Read The president would prefer the museum to highlight 'success,' 'brightness' and 'the future'
-
Trump to host Kennedy Honors for Kiss, StalloneSpeed Read Actor Sylvester Stallone and the glam-rock band Kiss were among those named as this year's inductees
-
White House seeks to bend Smithsonian to Trump's viewSpeed Read The Smithsonian Institution's 21 museums are under review to ensure their content aligns with the president's interpretation of American history
-
Charlamagne Tha God irks Trump with Epstein talkSpeed Read The radio host said the Jeffrey Epstein scandal could help 'traditional conservatives' take back the Republican Party
-
CBS cancels Colbert's 'Late Show'Speed Read 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert' is ending next year
-
Shakespeare not an absent spouse, study proposesspeed read A letter fragment suggests that the Shakespeares lived together all along, says scholar Matthew Steggle
-
New Mexico to investigate death of Gene Hackman, wifespeed read The Oscar-winning actor and his wife Betsy Arakawa were found dead in their home with no signs of foul play
