Psaki Defends FDA Revoking Use Of Monoclonal Antibody Treatments As Florida Sites Forced To Close | Eastern North Carolina Now

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    White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki defended the FDA during Tuesday's press briefing for revoking its emergency use authorization for monoclonal antibody treatments for COVID-19.

    The Florida Department of Health said in a statement: "Unfortunately, as a result of this abrupt decision made by the federal government, all monoclonal antibody state sites will be closed until further notice."

    When asked what her response was to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R), Psaki said, "Well, let's just take a step back here just to realize how crazy this is a little bit."

    "We've approached COVID treatments like filling a medicine cabinet, we're not relying on one type, one brand or treatment," she said. "We invested in and continue to buy a variety across monoclonal antibodies, pre-exposure prevention therapies, and oral antivirals."

    "What the FDA is making clear is that these treatments, the ones that they are fighting over, that the governor is fighting over, do not work against Omicron and they have side effects," she claimed. "That is what the scientists are saying. We have sent them twice 71,000 doses of treatments that are effective against Omicron and are effective also against Delta. And they are still advocating for treatments that don't work."

    WATCH:

   

Psaki responding to a question from AP's Josh Boak about Florida using monoclonal anti-bodies even though "they don't work against omicron": "Let's take a step back just to realize how crazy this is...The ones...[DeSantis] is fighting over do not work...& they have side-effects." pic.twitter.com/WWbLGootJW

— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 25, 2022

    TRANSCRIPT:

    REPORTER: The FDA yesterday withdrew the EUA for some monoclonal antibody treatments because they don't work against all Omicron. But Florida continues to push for the treatment for people in the state. What's your response to Governor DeSantis? And what's your message to the people of Florida?

    JEN PSAKI, PRESS SECRETRARY: Well, let's just take a step back here just to realize how crazy this is a little bit. We've approached COVID treatments like filling a medicine cabinet, we're not relying on one type, one brand or treatment. We invested in and continue to buy a variety across monoclonal antibodies, pre-exposure prevention therapies, and oral antivirals. We have provided 71,000 doses of antivirals to Florida, including 34,000 additional treatments that do work against Omicron, just this last week, I'm sorry about a range of those treatments I should say, to be clear. What the FDA is making clear is that these treatments, the ones that they are fighting over, that the governor is fighting over, do not work against Omicron and they have side effects. That is what the scientists are saying. We have sent them twice 71,000 doses of treatments that are effective against Omicron and are effective also against Delta. And they are still advocating for treatments that don't work. We've seen unfortunately from the beginning, in our pandemic response, a range of steps or pushes that have been made through social media platforms, unfortunately from the mouths of elected officials, and the advocating for things that don't work, even when we do know things do work, injecting disinfectant, promoting other pseudoscience, sowing doubt on the effectiveness of vaccines and boosters, and now promoting treatments that don't work. We know what works, vaccines and boosters. We have a range of doses of things that do work and treatments and we're providing those to Florida.

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