Hospitals Use a Lottery to Allocate Scarce COVID Drugs for the Immunocompromised

January 25, 2022

(NPR) – At Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, the initial deliveries of Evusheld covered less than 1% of their immune suppressed patients – and came with little guidance on how to make fair use of a limited supply, says Dr. Camille Kotton, clinical director of transplant and immunocompromised host infectious diseases. So the hospital devised a three-tier system to rank patients by medical need – and to give patients in the top tier an equal chance. “We put everybody’s name into a lottery,” she explains. “If people literally get their name pulled in the lottery, we bring them in for an injection.” (Read More)