Trump Announced the US Will Buy 90% of Antiviral Drugs Supply

Remdesivir is currently one of the most promising of the existing medicines for the treatment of diseases caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. The US authorities have purchased almost the entire world stock of Remdesivir, a drug used to treat the COVID-19 pulmonary disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. President Donald Trump said this at a briefing on Friday, July 24. “My administration has secured control of 90% of the world’s reserves of the remarkable drug Remdesivir,” he said. In early July, the British newspaper The Guardian reported that the United States authorities had bought almost all of their stocks of Remdesivir. According to the publication, the Trump administration bought more than 500 thousand doses from the Californian biopharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences. This represents all of the company’s stock for July and 90% of what the company will produce in August and September. Europeans hope for supplies of Remdesivir Remdesivir was originally developed by Gilead Sciences to combat Ebola, and has since been shown to be effective against the SARS and MERS coronaviruses. In mid-April, Canadian researchers reported that Remdesivir blocks the multiplication of the coronavirus. In May, the United States issued an emergency permit for the use of the drug to treat those infected with the coronavirus. “Although there is limited information on the safety and efficacy of Remdesivir in the treatment of hospitalized patients with coronavirus, the investigational drug has shown accelerated recovery times in some patients during clinical trials,” the US Department of Health’s FDA said in a press release. A similar decision was made by the authorities of a number of countries, including Japan, South Korea, India, Great Britain and Israel. The European Medicines Agency at the end of June recommended allowing the sale of Remdesivir in the EU countries. Gilead has pledged to supply the drug to Europe “in a reasonable amount”, the German health ministry said, hoping the manufacturer would honor the agreement.