I'm not sure how much PHAC will take this issue on, but I think that certainly there have been some recent studies that have suggested that Bamlanivimab is effective when used early. As I recall the numbers from The New England Journal of Medicine study, it decreased visits to the emergency room and hospitalizations from 4.5% to 1.5%, I believe, if given early, and in high-risk people, from 14% to 4.5%.
Yet in talking to clinicians, they're certainly having trouble accessing these forms of medication. It would certainly seem like potentially a second front on the fight against COVID if people who were at high risk once they got the disease.... There actually have been studies showing in terms of people in chronic care homes—I think you're probably familiar with this—that when it's given prophylactically to people who are negative for COVID so far, it reduces their risk of getting the disease. It would seem that this would have some usefulness in institutions or places where there's a high risk of contracting the disease and where the people themselves are at high risk if they get sick, and/or treating people who are at a high risk as soon as they get sick.
Have there been any efforts by the Public Health Agency of Canada to assist the provinces, which obviously have the primary responsibility, and to get them these forms of treatment earlier? Or do you still think this is too speculative?