The political and scientific fight over the COVID vaccines rages on, years later, with the belated acknowledgment by the FDA there were likely a small number of children killed by the vaccine, despite earlier denials.

Vaccine supporters are as unmoved by this as skeptics were of the FDA during the last administration. About 15% of U.S. adults got this year’s booster, according to the latest CDC survey. That might not be a failed product, but it certainly is a niche product. But what happened to the other part of Operation Warp Speed? We don’t hear much about monoclonal antibodies for prevention and treatment of infectious diseases anymore, even though they were extremely successful during the pandemic.

While vaccines stimulate the body to produce an immune response, monoclonal antibodies skip a few steps and infuse antibodies directly. Those antibodies attack pathogens just as the body’s own immune response would. Trials and real-world experience found them highly effective at reducing hospitalization and death during COVID, and most of us know somebody who received antibody treatment and felt better almost immediately. Most famously, President Trump rebounded sharply after receiving a Regeneron antibody infusion.

Monoclonal antibodies are also widely used for various cancers, which is the primary indication for most of the recently approved drugs of this type. There have been a pair of monoclonal antibodies for RSV prevention and one for Ebola treatment approved in recent years. But that’s it for infectious diseases, which is somewhat surprising given the resurgence of measles and other infections that have been dominating headlines.

One of the sad things we learned during COVID is there are some figures in the public health establishment that would prefer effective treatments not be available to people who decline a vaccine. They seem to view disease as an appropriate punishment for declining a vaccine.

That same mentality may explain why we are not seeing more sustained interest in monoclonal antibodies for the full range of infectious diseases. That’s unfortunate, because one of the key lessons from COVID should be that we need a full arsenal of both immunoprophylaxis and treatment. Monoclonal antibodies could effectively serve as both a substitute for vaccines among people who decline vaccines of for whom vaccines are ineffective, as well as treatments for everyone, regardless of vaccination status.

If the regulatory system were designed to support the technology, monoclonal antibodies could be rapidly adapted to and deployed against emerging variants or entirely new pathogens, unlike vaccines that often lag months behind. Yet the infrastructure and enthusiasm that drove Warp Speed’s monoclonal successes have largely evaporated. Funding has dried up, emergency use authorizations for most early COVID monoclonals were revoked as variants shifted, and no comparable push has materialized for measles, flu, or any other resurgent pathogens. The result is a gaping hole in our pandemic preparedness.

We fight over vaccines while neglecting the monoclonals that we should all be able to agree on. This imbalance is not inevitable. It reflects policy choices. If the lessons of the COVID experience were carried forward toward a broader infectious-disease portfolio, we could have quickly modifiable monoclonal antibody therapies ready for the next outbreak, whatever it is.

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Copyright 2026 Phil Kerpen, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Phil Kerpen is the president of American Commitment and the author of “Democracy Denied.” Kerpen can be reached at [email protected].