I’m all done with my preliminary visits for the clinical trial. Now I visit every other month and generally just give a blood sample.
Earlier this month I was concerned that this new XBB variant was going to kill off this trial the same way Omicron shut down Evusheld. As I thought, they were indeed mixing the new drug up in a petri dish with the strain du jour, and I got an email that said the drug doesn’t hold up as well as they hoped against XBB.
They didn’t mention it, but now we have BA.2.86 to contend with. Plus, any other variants we immune-compromised individuals will be blamed for whipping up. Still, it seems there is enough protection against Omicron to make my new drug useful.