The race-based approach in treatment has already begun to have real-world consequences. One Staten Island doctor said he filled two prescriptions for Paxlovid this week and was asked by the pharmacist to disclose the race of his patients before the treatment was authorized.
New York City will take a patient’s race into account when distributing potentially life-saving COVID treatments, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene revealed on their website.
The city will “consider race and ethnicity when assessing individual risk,” reads the agency’s official guidance from Dec. 20, which adds that “longstanding systemic health and social inequities” can contribute to an increased risk of dying from COVID-19.
The guidance applies to both the distribution of monoclonal antibodies and oral antivirals like Paxlovid and Molnupiravir.
“Monoclonal antibody treatments have averted at least 1,100 hospitalizations and at least 500 deaths among people treated in New York City,” the city said in October.
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