![]() Importantly, there had been no randomized controlled clinical-trial data on the safety and efficacy of the medicine in Covid-19 patients.Īs requests poured in, we faced tremendous pressure to respond immediately. And even if they were mistaken, they did not think it was feasible to safely reach the concentrations quoted in the laboratory research reports as being effective in achieving an antiviral effect against SARS-CoV-2 (the official name of the novel coronavirus). What’s more, as much as we wanted to identify treatments for Covid-19, our scientists had reviewed the data and didn’t believe the medicine could work against that disease. Early media reports indicated that the drug might be effective against that disease, and orders for the medicine surged.Įxcess demand might be a positive in some industries, but for J&J it created an ethical question: How to allocate supply to save the most lives? With thousands of new orders coming in from around the world, we knew that if we shifted to serving Covid-19 patients, we would very quickly run out of medicine for people with HIV. The demand was coming not from HIV patients but from doctors on the front lines of the Covid-19 pandemic. In early 2020, we at Johnson & Johnson found ourselves with an unusual problem: There were too many orders for an antiviral drug used to treat people with HIV. In addition, diverting the supply would have harmed those who needed the medicines for HIV. Acting hastily to fill the influx of orders early in the pandemic would not have helped patients with COVID-19. The benefits of this review process were born out months later when clinical studies on HIV antivirals in patients with COVID-19 showed that the drugs were not effective against COVID-19 in people. The company worked with internal and external independent experts, transparently laid out and shared the scientific data, and established and globally applied an ethical framework, all to ensure their decision-making process was rational, ethical and equitable. Instead of ramping up production, though, the company paused and followed a specific playbook for responding to crisis. Orders for the medicine surged beyond what the pharmaceutical company could produce. In early 2020, media reports indicated that an antiviral drug produced by Johnson & Johnson that was used to treat people with HIV might be effective against COVID-19. But it’s important to remember that we may end up doing more harm than good if we act too quickly, without first pausing to consider the objective rigor of the data underpinning decision-making as well as the broader impact of the decisions we make. There is a natural predisposition to act-to want to help, to jump in and do everything one can. ![]() ![]() During a crisis, it’s sometimes hard to pause. ![]()
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