Coronavirus Treatment: California Hospitals To Use Lottery System For Remdesivir Allocation

California hospitals will have to use a lottery system to properly allocate the supply of the coronavirus treatment, remdesivir, once it arrives from the state's Department of Public Health (CDPH).

According to reports, California is set to receive remdesivir for at least 100 to 200 COVID-19 patients as per a distribution list posted by CDPH. However, more than 3,000 patients with coronavirus symptoms are still in hospitals. The city of San Francisco, for example, will receive remdesivir for less than five patients but there are 70 patients waiting to get the treatment.

CDPH acknowledged the allocation for remdesivir, a COVID-19 treatment touted as the "standard of care" by Dr. Anthony Fauci, is scarce. Hence, hospitals are recommended to set up "a lottery system to select a certain proportion of patients who become eligible for the drug."

But elsewhere in the United States, remdesivir distribution is also posing problems for hospitals and health officials.

The Ohio Department of Health (ODH) said Wednesday the state received 100 vials of the drug. To decide on the allocation, the agency rounded up a group of doctors, health officials, pharmacists and politicians to choose how this drug will be distributed.

"The decision was based on the percentage of mechanically ventilated patients; which deems them to have the highest severity level," the ODH news release said. “Hospitals will be responsible for using clinical justification on the distribution of the medication to specific patients. Whenever the number of patients in need of remdesivir exceeds the supply of the medication, hospitals will use internal processes appropriate for the allocation of scarce resources."

In Massachusetts, the first wave of remdesivir was allocated to four hospitals.

"They did not appear to be four hospitals with the greatest need," Dr. Helen Boucher of the Tufts Medical Center told NPR. "It's just not clear to me what the process was and how they decided where a 'hot spot,' is to send the drug."

The supply of a remdesivir is a donation from Gilead Sciences after finalizing a deal with the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

According to the press release, Gilead Sciences will donate 607,000 vials of remdesivir within six weeks beginning May 7. This supply is expected to treat 78,000 COVID-19 patients at U.S. hospitals.

Remdesivir is actually an experimental treatment for COVID-19 patients. The National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which is headed by Fauci, discovered it can lessen the hospital stay and improve the recovery time of patients with serious symptoms of COVID-19.