Pardee UNC Health Care now has a limited supply of therapeutic antibodies.
It can be used in treating the omicron COVID-19 variant.
But health officials say due to the limited supply, the criteria for who can get it is more strict.
"Unfortunately there's very little bit of it available," said Dr. David Ellis Pardee UNC Health Care's chief medical officer. "Only about 100 doses came to WNC. We have about 35-40 of those doses at Pardee. Because of this the criteria, for getting the antibody it's much more stringent."
In order to receive the treatment, patients must be 70-years-or-older if they're unvaccinated, and 80-years-or-older if they are vaccinated.
Patients must be referred by a doctor in order to receive the treatment. Updated eligibility criteria can be found online here.
The news comes as a follow up to the hospital's previous announcement in December that it would be closing its outpatient COVID infusion clinic due to an increase in cases, the spread of the omicron variant and supply issues.
While the monoclonal antibody treatments previously available for infusions were highly effective at treating COVID-19 and the most recent variants, they are not as effective at treating the omicron-driven cases.
"Even though there is no way of verifying variant status at a local level, it is now believed that the majority of current COVID cases are the result of the highly contagious Omicron variant," Pardee said in a press release.
Dr. Ellis shared the following statements, in part, in a press release, urging everyone to stay cautious during the holiday season:
We cannot underscore enough the importance of taking this new variant seriously... Clearly being vaccinated is no longer a guarantee of not contracting the virus; however, it does provide a certain level of protection from serious illness, hospitalization and death.
