Brendan Cole
7/1/20
Public health experts in the U.K. and Australia have expressed alarm at the move by the U.S. to purchase almost the entire global supply of a drug to treat the coronavirus.
Remdesivir, made by Gilead, was originally trialled during the Ebola epidemic and is the first drug that has been approved by licensing authorities in the U.S. to treat COVID-19 after trials showed that it helped some recover from the disease more quickly.
The Trump administration has purchased more than 500,000 doses, which is all of Gilead's production of the drug for this month and 90 percent of its projected supply for August and September. It is made under patent to Gilead, at a cost of around $3,200 per treatment of six doses for richer countries.
However the move by the U.S. to buy almost all stocks has angered Andrew Hill, senior visiting research fellow at Liverpool University, especially as the drug was one of two tested in the U.K. which now may not get access to remdesivir until October.
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