Call to expand eligibility for Covid-19 antiviral medications in Australia

The TGA has examined rapid antigen tests to see what Covid kit is the best. Take the test to see how your RAT rates.

Exclusive: Health experts have urged an expansion of access to Covid antiviral medications as Covid cases and hospitalisation skyrocket.

The call comes as the Saturday Herald Sun can reveal the use-by date on thousands of doses of high-cost Covid antiviral medications in a government stockpile have been arbitrarily doubled so they don’t have to be tossed out.

It is the second time the use-by date has been extended to save the government from wasting hundreds of millions of taxpayer’s dollars on unused drugs. But experts insist they are still safe to use.

“The medications were made available fairly quickly and now there’s more information to show that they continue to be stable and continue to be okay to be used,” Professor Michael Dooley, the director of Pharmacy at The Alfred Hospital in Melbourne, said.

Covid-19 antiviral drug Paxlovid

Covid antiviral drugs Paxlovid and Lagevrio, which cost the government around $1000 per course, must be taken within the first five days of an infection and can cut the severity of the illness, the risk of death and reduce the need for hospital admission.

To be eligible for antivirals, patients need a positive RAT or PCR test but a meeting of experts was told two weeks ago some RATs are detecting as few as 17 per cent of cases.

Doctors said they were under siege from patients suffering from Covid who want access to antiviral medications.

At present, the drugs are only freely available to people aged over 70.

People aged over 50 can also access them but only if they have two risk factors, like Type 2 diabetes or heart and kidney failure.

Younger people are only eligible if they have cancer, a disability or several specific conditions.

Infectious diseases expert Professor Paul Griffin, of The University of Queensland. Picture: NewsWire/Sarah Marshall

“I would like to see that eligibility expanded,” University Queensland infectious diseases expert Professor Paul Griffin said.

“We could certainly argue that given what we’re seeing in terms of the burden on the health care system at the moment, and that for some variants that other measures like vaccination and monoclonal antibodies might work less well.”

Sydney Haematologist Associate Professor Nada Hamad, who has had Covid three times, said people with serious health issues were missing out on antivirals.

“If you’ve got three or four illnesses or comorbidities that don’t fit into the guidelines you still don’t qualify. If you’ve been hospitalised in the last year, for a major heart attack, you don’t qualify,” she said.

However, Professor Collignon said there was little evidence the antivirals were of benefit to an immunised person under the age of 60 “unless you’ve got major underlying disease”.

Professor Catherine Bennett, of Deakin University.

Deakin University Professor Catherine Bennett said antivirals were available for wider use just not subsidised, and “that is a decision that must be based on supply and then cost benefit”.

The Department of Health said as new evidence emerged that Covid antivirals had a longer shelf life than initially thought, the Therapeutic Goods Administration had extended their use by date.

This means “all stocks purchased by the Government remain within the TGA approved shelf-life”, the department said.

The TGA has tested Covid tests, check if you RAT test works here.

Originally published as Call to expand eligibility for Covid-19 antiviral medications in Australia