A Pfizer's pill called Paxlovid is manufactured in Ascoli, Italy, in this handout photo.
The US has bought 10 million courses of Pfizer's Covid treatment pill, an oral antiviral medication that was highly effective in preventing hospitalization among high-risk adults in a clinical trial, according to President Joe Biden.
Paxlovid could change the fight against the virus by giving patients a drug that they can take home. Hospitals have faced a lot of stress during the Pandemic and a highly effective at- home treatment could help.
Biden said that his administration was making the necessary preparations to make the treatments accessible and free. This is good news. This treatment could be used to accelerate our path out of the Pandemic.
Delivery of the pills will start at the end of this year and continue through 2022, according to Biden.
Pfizer applied to the FDA for emergency authorization for the pill. ritonavir is a widely used HIV drug.
According to Pfizer, Paxlovid prevented hospitalization and death when taken within three days of symptom onset in a clinical trial of adults age 18 and over who were more susceptible to contracting severe Covid. ritonavir is a widely used HIV drug.
Paxlovid blocks the activity of an enzyme that the virus needs to replicate. The HIV drug, ritonavir, slows the patients metabolism and allows it to stay in the body for a longer period.
There are few options for physicians to treat Covid patients. The anti-viral drug remdesivir is used to treat patients who are already hospitalized, while the expensive monoclonal antibody treatments are not.
Paxlovid is promising, but supplies are likely to be tight. Pfizer will ramp up production to 50 million courses by the end of the year and will manufacture 180,000 courses next month.
Pfizer will allow generic drug manufacturers to make the pill and give it to 95 low and middle-income countries. If the World Health Organization deems Covid as an international health emergency, the drug company will waive royalties for low-income countries.
