EVUSHELD is in short supply. And to put it politely, distribution has been inequitable.
This extra half-million on top of the 1.1 million doses (100,000 doses were earmarked for the military and not available to the general public) already ordered by the government for distribution is a welcome addition. But it falls way short of what should be happening.
There are seven million immunocompromised (IC) people in the US by conservative estimates. So now, all we need is another 5.4 million doses. So we will have slowly and haphazardly done for the IC community what we did with alacrity and purpose for the other 97% of the population (who have normal immune systems) with vaccine distribution.
Assuming this current rollout pace of about 50,000 doses a week continues, and we eventually get enough for all seven million, it will be almost three years until everyone is protected. And that doesn’t account for the fact that EVUSHELD’s continued efficacy is unproven beyond six months. So we will need to re-protect everyone at least once, if not twice, every year.
This is unjust and almost discriminatory against the vulnerable.
CLL Society will continue advocating to make the voices of the immunocompromised known to our government and health officials on this matter. We will also keep working with other organizations as much as possible to fix this mess.
Here is the link to the press release.
Stay strong. We are all in this together.
Brian
Brian Koffman MDCM (retired) MS Ed (he, him, his)
Co-Founder, Executive VP, and Chief Medical Officer
