Researchers in the United States, in a study for Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, have announced that its antibody drug cocktail showed positive results in rhesus macaques and hamsters. Now the researchers are hoping that it might work for people as well, as per a News Medical and Life Sciences report.

A combination of two antibodies significantly reduced airway viral load and virus-induced pathology that will work in both mild and severe cases.

Christos Kyratsous and colleagues from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, New York, had previously identified that a combination of the antibodies, which targets the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, potently neutralises the virus in vitro.

The virus uses the spike protein as a structure that binds it to human host cell membranes that helps the virus to enter. The research is published on the preprint server bioRxiv in August 2020.

The researchers have demonstrated the efficacy of the antibody cocktail in two animal models: the rhesus macaque and the golden hamster. This follows collaboration with the Texas Biomedical Research Institute and BIOQUAL in Rockville, Maryland.

The authors noted that their findings provide evidence that this REGN-CoV-2 therapy, which is currently being tested in clinical trials of Covid-19, may provide significant clinical benefit in both the prevention and treatment setting, Life Sciences added.

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