Cardiff, UK: A new treatment may soon help protect people from developing severe covid. astraZeneca has just released the results of a Phase III clinical trial – the final phase of testing before a drug is authorized – that suggest its new covid The treatment, AZD7442, is effective in reducing severe illness or death in non-hospitalized Covid patients.
treatment includes Antibodies, which usually arise naturally in response to a covid infection or vaccination. They work by recognizing specific parts of SARS-CoV-2 – the virus that causes covid – and either attacking these directly or forcing the virus to stop working and passing it to other parts of the immune system. Flagged for destruction by parts.
After doing their job of clearing the virus, the antibodies remain in the body for some time, forming part of our immunological memory. If their goal is met again, they can leap into action.
The new treatment, AZD7442, uses special antibodies called monoclonal antibodies. These are antibodies produced in a laboratory that mimic the body’s natural defenses – in this case mimic the immune system’s response to Covid.
Artificially developing antibodies to fight disease is not a new technology. This technology is already being used to treat many diseases, including leukemia, breast cancer and lupus. In fact, this is not even the first time this technology has been used for COVID. The first Covid monoclonal antibody treatment was approved in the UK in August 2021.
How does AstraZeneca’s treatment work?
AZD7442 is a cocktail of two monoclonal antibodies – tixagevimab and cilgavimab – that are designed to reduce the severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection and therefore prevent people from becoming seriously ill.
Both of these antibodies bind to different parts of the virus’s spike protein, which covers its outer surface and is what the virus uses to infect cells. It is thought that binding to these proteins is what gives the drug its effect, as it prevents the virus from being able to enter cells and reproduce.
The two monoclonal antibodies in the cocktail are based on antibodies taken from patients who have survived Covid. Scientists at AstraZeneca took blood samples from patients and isolated immune cells called B cells, which are the antibody factories of the human body. They then grew more of these B cells in the lab, and used them to produce large amounts of two antibodies they had identified as specifically targeting the coronavirus’s spike protein.
But the key difference between this and other antibody-based treatments is that in AZD7442, the antibodies are modified so that they stay in the body longer.
Studies using similarly modified antibodies against another respiratory virus have shown that this approach gives long-term protection, with the modified antibody having three times the durability of conventional antibodies. It is hoped that a single dose of AZD7442 may provide 12 to 18 months of protection against severe covid, although we will have to wait to see how long the protection lasts.
How well does it work?
AstraZeneca’s Phase 3 trial examined the effectiveness of the treatment when given to patients infected with SARS-CoV-2.
The study looked at 822 participants who were over the age of 18. Only about 13% were 65 years and above, but 90% had health conditions that put them at high risk of severe covid such as cancer, diabetes, obesity, chronic lung disease. disease or asthma, heart disease or a weakened immune system.
Trial results show that 18 out of 407 people who received AZD7442 developed severe covid or died, compared to 37 out of 415 people who received placebo. This suggests that people in the AZD7442 group were 50% less likely to develop severe covid than those taking a placebo.
The trial also looked specifically at patients who received treatment quickly — that is, within five days after their symptoms began. In this group, AZD7442 reduced the risk of serious illness or death by 67%, suggesting that early treatment with AZD7442 provides greater protection.
However, it is important to note that these results have been released by AstraZeneca, but have not yet been formally reviewed by other scientists. Any conclusion therefore needs to be treated with caution.
How useful would this be?
These results suggest that AZD7442 may be a valuable tool for patients in need of immediate immunity against Covid, such as those who have not responded to vaccines due to weakened immune systems or other high-risk groups.
However, more detail is needed about the characteristics of patients who did not benefit from the drug and to fully understand who would benefit most from receiving this drug.
And when considering how useful AZD7442 may be, it is important to consider when treatment will be given during the course of the illness. For many people, severe illness with covid is not caused by replication of the virus, but by the deterioration of the immune system.
This means that drugs, such as AZD7442, need to be given at the onset of infection, before an overactive immune response can begin, to prevent severe disease. Give them too late, and treatments that directly target the virus are unlikely to provide much benefit (as opposed to those that can control inflammation and immune redundancy, such as dexamethasone or tocilizumab).
But one thing that can help is to start treatment early during an infection, is that it only needs to be injected into a muscle, and not intravenously. This means it can be given in a clinic, without patients needing to come to the hospital.
However, monoclonal antibody treatments are extremely expensive, and the cost of AZD7442 has not yet been released. This could be the biggest hurdle for a drug with large impact around the world — of course, assuming its Phase 3 results pass regulatory scrutiny and the drug is approved.
treatment includes Antibodies, which usually arise naturally in response to a covid infection or vaccination. They work by recognizing specific parts of SARS-CoV-2 – the virus that causes covid – and either attacking these directly or forcing the virus to stop working and passing it to other parts of the immune system. Flagged for destruction by parts.
After doing their job of clearing the virus, the antibodies remain in the body for some time, forming part of our immunological memory. If their goal is met again, they can leap into action.
The new treatment, AZD7442, uses special antibodies called monoclonal antibodies. These are antibodies produced in a laboratory that mimic the body’s natural defenses – in this case mimic the immune system’s response to Covid.
Artificially developing antibodies to fight disease is not a new technology. This technology is already being used to treat many diseases, including leukemia, breast cancer and lupus. In fact, this is not even the first time this technology has been used for COVID. The first Covid monoclonal antibody treatment was approved in the UK in August 2021.
How does AstraZeneca’s treatment work?
AZD7442 is a cocktail of two monoclonal antibodies – tixagevimab and cilgavimab – that are designed to reduce the severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection and therefore prevent people from becoming seriously ill.
Both of these antibodies bind to different parts of the virus’s spike protein, which covers its outer surface and is what the virus uses to infect cells. It is thought that binding to these proteins is what gives the drug its effect, as it prevents the virus from being able to enter cells and reproduce.
The two monoclonal antibodies in the cocktail are based on antibodies taken from patients who have survived Covid. Scientists at AstraZeneca took blood samples from patients and isolated immune cells called B cells, which are the antibody factories of the human body. They then grew more of these B cells in the lab, and used them to produce large amounts of two antibodies they had identified as specifically targeting the coronavirus’s spike protein.
But the key difference between this and other antibody-based treatments is that in AZD7442, the antibodies are modified so that they stay in the body longer.
Studies using similarly modified antibodies against another respiratory virus have shown that this approach gives long-term protection, with the modified antibody having three times the durability of conventional antibodies. It is hoped that a single dose of AZD7442 may provide 12 to 18 months of protection against severe covid, although we will have to wait to see how long the protection lasts.
How well does it work?
AstraZeneca’s Phase 3 trial examined the effectiveness of the treatment when given to patients infected with SARS-CoV-2.
The study looked at 822 participants who were over the age of 18. Only about 13% were 65 years and above, but 90% had health conditions that put them at high risk of severe covid such as cancer, diabetes, obesity, chronic lung disease. disease or asthma, heart disease or a weakened immune system.
Trial results show that 18 out of 407 people who received AZD7442 developed severe covid or died, compared to 37 out of 415 people who received placebo. This suggests that people in the AZD7442 group were 50% less likely to develop severe covid than those taking a placebo.
The trial also looked specifically at patients who received treatment quickly — that is, within five days after their symptoms began. In this group, AZD7442 reduced the risk of serious illness or death by 67%, suggesting that early treatment with AZD7442 provides greater protection.
However, it is important to note that these results have been released by AstraZeneca, but have not yet been formally reviewed by other scientists. Any conclusion therefore needs to be treated with caution.
How useful would this be?
These results suggest that AZD7442 may be a valuable tool for patients in need of immediate immunity against Covid, such as those who have not responded to vaccines due to weakened immune systems or other high-risk groups.
However, more detail is needed about the characteristics of patients who did not benefit from the drug and to fully understand who would benefit most from receiving this drug.
And when considering how useful AZD7442 may be, it is important to consider when treatment will be given during the course of the illness. For many people, severe illness with covid is not caused by replication of the virus, but by the deterioration of the immune system.
This means that drugs, such as AZD7442, need to be given at the onset of infection, before an overactive immune response can begin, to prevent severe disease. Give them too late, and treatments that directly target the virus are unlikely to provide much benefit (as opposed to those that can control inflammation and immune redundancy, such as dexamethasone or tocilizumab).
But one thing that can help is to start treatment early during an infection, is that it only needs to be injected into a muscle, and not intravenously. This means it can be given in a clinic, without patients needing to come to the hospital.
However, monoclonal antibody treatments are extremely expensive, and the cost of AZD7442 has not yet been released. This could be the biggest hurdle for a drug with large impact around the world — of course, assuming its Phase 3 results pass regulatory scrutiny and the drug is approved.
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