Coronavirus latest: Biden calls out governors ‘undermining’ his plan to boost vaccinations

Florida may buy monoclonal antibody treatments directly from GlaxoSmithKline, governor Ron DeSantis said, amid a dust-up with the Biden administration over supplies of a similar drug from Regeneron.

DeSantis said on Thursday he spoke with executives from GSK and that Florida “can potentially order” doses of the company’s monoclonal antibody drug. “We will do that if we can,” he added.

The state last month launched monoclonal antibody treatment centres and mobile units, part of an effort to prevent coronavirus-infected people from developing more severe symptoms that require hospitalisation.

The Department of Health and Human Services recently made changes to its distribution of monoclonal antibodies after Joe Biden pledged that the federal government would increase shipments overall by 50 per cent. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Thursday the government’s supply of Regeneron’s treatment “is not unlimited, and we believe it should be equitable across states.”

Seven states, including Florida, have accounted for 70 per cent of orders, according to Psaki.

However, as a result of the change, shipments to Florida have dropped to 30,950 treatments per week from 72,000, according to Christina Pushaw, a spokesperson for DeSantis.

The governor, speaking at a health centre in Fort Lauderdale, said Florida could use its own potential supply of GSK’s monoclonal antibody drug, called sotrovimab, to “meet any of the shortfalls”.

“We’ve been thrown a major curveball here with a really huge cut from HHS and the Biden administration,” DeSantis said.

Data have shown that the number people hospitalised with Covid-19 in Florida has declined in recent weeks, an encouraging sign following a summer wave of the virus attributed to the Delta variant. Officials said on Thursday the statewide tally for Covid-19 patients in hospital had declined for 24 consecutive days.