AstraZeneca’s preventive COVID therapy no longer effective against current variants

AstraZeneca
AZN,
-0.96%

AZN,
-1.54%
said Thursday that the Food and Drug Administration is no longer allowing healthcare providers to prescribe Evusheld, a therapy authorized for pre-exposure prophylaxis of COVID-19, citing its lack of effectiveness against the currently circulating variants. The company said Evusheld does not neutralize subvariants like XBB.1.5, BQ.1, and BQ.1.1 — the three most common strains of the virus circulating in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Evusheld is authorized to prevent COVID infections in people who are severely immunocompromised.U.S.-listed shares of AstraZeneca are up 15.1% over the past year, while the S&P 500
SPX,
+1.10%
has declined 6.2%.