October 25, 2021
14:07
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The US drugmaker Merck & Co Inc said on Monday that the European Union’s drug regulator had begun a real-time review of the company’s experimental antiviral drug against Covid-19 for adults, Reuters reported, quoted by BNR.
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–According to the procedure, also known as “continuous review”, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) will evaluate the data as soon as it becomes available, instead of waiting for a formal application when all the necessary information has been collected.
While vaccines are the main weapon against Covid-19 at this stage, Merck’s experimental pill molnupiravir may change the fight against the coronavirus, as studies have shown that it can halve the chances of death or hospitalization for those who are most at risk for severe Covid disease.
Merck, which is developing molnupivir with its partner Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, applied on October 11 for permission to use the drug urgently in the United States. A group of outside advisers to the US health regulator is scheduled to hold a meeting in late November to discuss whether to allow the experimental antiviral pill.
If approved by regulators, molnupiravir will become the first oral drug for Covid-19, as well as the first treatment for patients with mild illness, while existing drugs are used primarily to treat critically ill patients.
The drugmaker has a contract with the US government to supply 1.7 million courses of this drug at a price of $ 700 per course. Merck also recently signed supply contracts with a number of other countries, including the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore.
An EU spokesman told Reuters earlier this month that the bloc was also considering signing an agreement to supply Merck’s antiviral pill, but would not do so until the company began the process of seeking approval for the drug.
