COVID-19 antiviral pill: Who is eligible to receive Paxlovid in B.C.?

This image provided by Pfizer shows the company's COVID-19 Paxlovid pills. (Pfizer via AP, File)

It's been two weeks since Health Canada approved another tool in the fight against COVID-19, and B.C. health officials are working to determine who would be best suited to receive it, given the province's limited supply.

The COVID-19 antiviral treatment Paxlovid is the first oral and at-home prescription medication to be cleared for use in the country and it could help prevent more serious illness if it's given to people early on.

In a news conference Tuesday, Dr. Bonnie Henry said the province's therapeutics committee is coming up with a "rational approach" on how Paxlovid will be distributed in B.C.

"This is another positive step forward in our COVID-19 journey and the treatment is specifically for people who are at highest risk of having more severe illness and hospitalization," said Henry.

Henry added that in order to be effective, Paxlovid needs to be started within five days of the onset of symptoms.

"Of course we need to make sure that we have testing available for people," she said. "So we've been aligning both the limited supply we have of about 4,000 treatment doses of these medications, with our testing strategy as well."

Henry said health officials have developed a hub-and-spoke model to ensure the medication is available through the province's infectious disease teams.

"They will be able to identify people for this very initial supply of medication, who are most at-risk and who we can get it to in that critical period of time," said Henry.

Henry also referred to a heat map presented in a previous COVID-19 briefing, designed to identify British Columbians who are most at-risk of requiring hospital care if they become infected with COVID-19.

"We've identified that it is essentially the people who are in our critically extrememly vulnerable groups," she said. "Those are the people who have immune compromising conditions because of medications that they're on because of having had a transplant or undergoing certain cancer therapies. So those are the people who will now have access to this drug."

Other groups considered most at-risk are those over the age of 70 and younger people who have additional medical conditions and don't have the protection of vaccines.

Henry added that every medication comes with both benefits and risks, and that this new antiviral combination has some contraindications, meaning it should not be used in some cases.

"Unfortunately many of the people who would potentially benefit from this medication, take some of those medications that interact with it, and makes it very different from some of the other antivirals we have like Tamiflu, for example," she said.

"We have to be mindful of people's kidney function, of the immune suppressant medications they're on, anticoagulants. These are some of the very serious interactions."

Henry said while this new tool is a step in the right direction, there's still much to learn about how to use it and the risks and benefits associated with it.

"Most importantly, (Paxlovid) is used once somebody has been infected and is at-risk of having severe enough illness to need hospitalization," said Henry. "And we know that the most important thing we can do is prevent infection in the first place, and particularly in people who are at high-risk, the importance of vaccination."