Status: 23.12.2021 1:13 p.m.
Shortly after the US drug agency issued an emergency approval for this, the federal government is trying to get the corona pill Paxlovid. The European Medicines Agency is still reviewing the drug.
Germany is making efforts to quickly procure the corona drug Paxlovid, which had received emergency approval in the USA. According to a spokesman, the Federal Ministry of Health is “negotiating with manufacturers to secure contingents for Germany and to make them available for supply in a timely manner”.
In addition to the Paxlovid product from the US company Pfizer, this also applies to the product Lagevrio, which is manufactured by the US company MSD. Both are antivirals that prevent the virus from reproducing.
No approval in the EU yet
However, the preparations are not yet approved in the EU. At the European Medicines Agency EMA, however, “evaluation procedures with the aim of approval have already been started,” said a spokesman for the Federal Ministry of Health of the AFP news agency. After approval, the funds should be used in Germany primarily for high-risk patients – for example, patients over 60 years of age and people with ailments such as obesity and diabetes.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency approval to Paxlovid for high-risk patients aged twelve and over on Wednesday. One of the advantages is that paxlovid and molnupiravir can be taken as a pill at home. Other agents such as the antiviral drug Remdesivir, on the other hand, have to be administered intravenously and therefore in hospitals.
The pill is supposed to prevent the serious course of the disease
Paxlovid slows the virus from multiplying. Those who are ill take the pill at home twice a day for five days. There is also another preparation that is already used in HIV patients. This treatment is designed to avoid getting seriously ill – and possibly having to go to hospital.
According to the manufacturer Pfizer, Paxlovid lowers the risk of hospitalization or death by almost 90 percent. The FDA had stated: “At a crucial point in the pandemic with the appearance of new variants, this approval brings a new tool to combat Covid-19.”
Still far from mass production
US President Joe Biden promised Pfizer government support to ramp up production of the drug quickly, as Pfizer is still a long way from mass production. The production of the drug currently takes six to eight months.
The US government has already pre-ordered around ten million packs for around five billion dollars. One pack corresponds to one treatment. And the first of these could be delivered this year, the White House announced. Around 265,000 packs should then be available in January.
Great Britain also orders a lot of pills
The British government recently signed a supply contract for millions more doses of the two corona drugs. According to its own information, Great Britain will receive a total of 4.25 million units of the drugs from the pharmaceutical companies MSD and Pfizer from the beginning of 2022. Great Britain was the first country in the world to approve the MSD drug Lagevrio at the beginning of November.
Lagevrio is currently being used in a nationwide study at Oxford University that will open to people with Covid-19 symptoms. The drug has also been approved for people at high risk of developing the disease more seriously, including cancer patients.
Paxlovid should be used “as soon as possible” in the same way, according to the UK government, once it has received the go-ahead from the UK Medicines Agency (MHRA).