US authorities have already approved remdesivir as a drug for COVID-19. The company distributed the first 140,000 doses of the product worldwide as part of testing, all of which were already received by patients. Now the US government has ordered more than 500,000 doses, representing all remdesivir production for July and ninety percent of production capacity for August and September.
“President Trump has achieved great business and ensured that Americans have access to the first approved drug for COVID-19,” said US Secretary of Health Alex Azar. “We want to make sure that any American who needs a remdesivir can get it,” he added.
The US government is trying to overpay or otherwise exclude other people from the game in the case of other drugs that could work against COVID-19, writes The Guardian. For example, the French company Sanofi announced that the US has secured the right to preferential access to the coronavirus vaccine under development if it works. The company later called it off under pressure from the French government.
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned that an aggressive US strategy affecting even US allies could have side effects. “It is in the interest of both our countries to work together to ensure the security of our citizens,” he said.
Gilead Sciences has patented remdesivir and controls who can make it. She set the price for the five-day treatment at $ 2,340, which is significantly less than recommended by the US State Institute for Drug Control. Under the agreement with Gilead, companies from Egypt, India and Pakistan can also manufacture the drug and then distribute it to 127 developing countries.
According to Professor Barbara Mintzes of the University of Sydney School of Pharmacy, the developed world can only benefit from the emergency provisions for public health threats enshrined in international trade agreements in the current situation. “Governments can issue compulsory licenses to circumvent patent protection and either manufacture drugs themselves or buy them from generic manufacturers,” she told Medicines Law & Policy.
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Remdesivir, which was developed in Gilead Sciences by a team led by the Czech Tomáš Cihlář, has already been recommended for approval by the European Medicines Agency and its decision is expected to be confirmed by the European Commission in the coming days. After that, the medicine sold under the name Veklury could also be prescribed by European doctors.
From recent events, it is evident that the cornavir pandemic is out of control in the United States. Leading epidemiologist Anthony Fauci in the Senate warned that the situation would quickly worsen again after a temporary improvement. “We’re moving in the wrong direction,” he said.
The United States recorded a record daily increase of 40,000 cases last week. “I would not be surprised if we reached one hundred thousand a day if we could not reverse the trend,” he added. When asked how many victims the disease would require, he did not answer directly. “I can guarantee that it will be very worrying,” he said.
To date, the US has reported more than 2.5 million cases of coronavirus. Some countries have already begun to dismantle measures against the spread of the disease, but are now implementing them again.
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