Culture Wars Reach Labeling For COVID-19 Treatments

 
• By Derrick Gingery
  
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Senators ask US FDA to change statements in COVID-19 monoclonal antibody fact sheets that factors like race or ethnicity may place a patient high-risk of serious illness, saying they promote racist decisions.

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CDC data shows that some minority groups have higher rates of hospitalization and death from COVID-19 compared to Whites. • Source: Alamy

Several Republican Senators are urging on the US Food and Drug Administration to change its fact sheets for COVID monoclonal antibodies to remove references to race and ethnicity. The push is yet another political challenge to the agency’s scientific decision-making, one that could pull the FDA into the ongoing culture war over what should, and should not, be said about race.

Monoclonal antibodies authorized as coronavirus treatments, such as GlaxoSmithKline plc’s sotrovimab, Eli Lilly and Company’s bamlanivimab and etesevimab,...

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