HOUSTON – The Houston Methodist Hospital is now administering the FDA emergency use authorization drug, bamlanivimab. There are three sites where the hospital offers monoclonal antibody infusions: Houston Methodist Hospital at the Texas Medical Center, Houston Methodist Sugar Land and Houston Methodist Continuing Care Facility near the West campus in Katy. Since the hospital system started this therapy on Friday, they said 50 patients have been treated. Sandy Zeluff said she was one of the first patients to receive this treatment. After her symptoms were getting progressively worse last week, she says she made a recovery within a day of infusion.

Greg Abbott announced Friday that the Texas Department of State Health Services is going to distribute a COVID-19 antibody therapy to hospitals across Texas. Abbott’s office said it is allocating an initial shipment of Bamlanivimab, the Eli Lilly & Company monoclonal antibody therapy, to be distributed as early as next week to acute care hospitals across the state. Bamlanivimab is for outpatient use in people who have tested positive for COVID-19 and are at increased risk of severe disease. Abbott’s office said DSHS will allocate this initial distribution of Bamlanivimab based on three criteria: new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the community, new lab-confirmed COVID-19 admissions to hospitals, and total lab-confirmed COVID-19 patients in hospitals. “I thank the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for providing Texas with this crucial antibody therapy that will help keep Texans safe and mitigate the spread of COVID-19.”