The White House coronavirus task force will review the Trump administration’s initial “misalignment” in the distribution of the drug remdesivir, the group’s response coordinator said in an email obtained by The Wall Street Journal.
Dr. Deborah Birx sent the email to members of the task force on May 7, informing them that the group will conduct a review of “the decision-making process, the lack of engagement of Task Force, and the methodology and analysis used by the data and modeling group that resulted in the misalignment of the therapeutic and on-the-ground current need in the first shipment so we can be assured this doesn’t occur in the future.”
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the drug for emergency use after it was found to help speed recovery in some patients with the coronavirus on the first of the month, but only certain hospitals were told they would receive the drug, and many of those shipments have failed to reach their destination.
On May 9, two days after Birx sent the email, the Department of Health and Human Services announced that it would start shipping the drug to states, who would then allocate their supply to the hospitals that need it the most.
“Last week, it felt very opaque; we had no idea who was making decisions at the federal level regarding allocation, and what were the criteria,” said Dr. Daniel Kaul, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan. “In general, we feel better this week.”
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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