The Pfizer anti Covid pill between good intentions and limits
Pfizer waives royalties on its anti Covid pill but, once again, many countries remain excluded. This is what the agreement for low-income nations provides
Pfizer has submitted to the Food and Drug Administration ( Fda ) the authorization for the emergency use of its anti Covid pill Paxlovid. The pharmaceutical company will also share the license of the drug , thus allowing the poorest countries to produce it.
Meanwhile, The Washington Post , the US President Joe Biden this week is expected to announce the purchase of 10 million Paxlovid packs.
THE AGREEMENT FOR THE POOR COUNTRIES
Pfizer said it will allow generic drug manufacturers to supply its antiviral pill to 95 low- and middle-income countries through a licensing agreement with Medicines Patent Pool (MPP), the United Nations-backed non-profit organization for access to medicines in poor countries.
"We are extremely pleased to have another weapon to protect people from the ravages of Covid-19," said Charles Gore, executive director of the MMP.
The deal will allow the organization to sub-license qualified generic drug manufacturers to make their own versions of the pill.
WHICH COUNTRIES ARE COVERED BY THE AGREEMENT
The 95 countries of the agreement, Reuters reports , cover about 53% of the world's population and include all low- and middle-income countries and some upper-middle-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
It also includes countries that have moved from low-middle to high-middle income status in the past five years.
Pfizer will waive royalties on sales in low-income countries and also in other countries covered by the agreement as long as Covid is classified as a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization (WHO).
WHO IS NOT SATISFIED WITH THE AGREEMENT
However, the international organization Medecins Sans Frontieres said it was "discouraged" by the agreement which, it said, is restrictive and excludes countries such as Argentina and China that have a consolidated capacity to produce generic drugs.
Not only. The New York Times also pointed out that the agreement excludes some countries hard hit by the pandemic. Among these, Cuba, Jamaica, Thailand, Iraq, Libya. Being excluded means that if these countries want to buy Pfizer's anti-Covid pill they will have to do it directly from companies, probably incurring higher prices than generics.
Brazil, where the pandemic has caused 12% of total deaths, is also not part of the countries that will benefit from the agreement. Or rather, we read on NbcNews , it will be able to produce the generic but only to export it .
PFIZER FORECASTS
Pfizer expects to produce 180,000 treatment cycles by the end of next month and at least 50 million cycles by the end of 2022.
A group executive told Reuters that the drug market could affect up to 150 million people and that many countries may also be interested in buying doses for their strategic reserves.
HOW MUCH THE PFIZER PILLS WILL COST
The company said it will sell the supplies at prices based on each country's income level. The United States, for example, is expected to charge for its treatment about the same as its competitor Merck, which has set a cost of around $ 700 per cycle and has already entered into licensing agreements in over 100 countries.
However, some international health officials cited by Reuters said even these advances will still not be enough to adequately reach the countries furthest behind with vaccination.
As Start already wrote , Pfizer's anti Covid pill, in fact, to obtain satisfactory results must be taken within 5 days of diagnosis and in less advanced countries this can represent a major limitation.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/sanita/la-pillola-pfizer-anti-covid-tra-buone-intenzioni-e-limiti/ on Wed, 17 Nov 2021 10:39:52 +0000.