UC Irvine

Antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 envelope spike protein (S) are foundational for targeted therapies to reduce severity of COVID-19. Antibodies can neutralize extracellular virus and can potentially mediate other functions to inhibit virus. In this study, we determined the impact of primary human monocytes combined with COVA1-18, a SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing monoclonal antibody(mAB), on the yield of SARS-CoV-2 from infected cells. We found that antibody combined with monocytes resulted in lower viral yield than antibodies alone. Our findings suggest that enhancing interactions between mAB’s and monocytes may improve the efficacy of mAB therapy for COVID-19.