LONDON – The British drug regulatory agency (Mhra) approved today – ahead of anyone else in Europe – Molnupiravir, the first pill indicated for the treatment of Covid to be registered. The medicine, created and illustrated in recent weeks by the American giant Merck Sharp & Dohme in partnership with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, can be prescribed to anyone who is tested positive for Covid and has at least one risk factor linked to a possible serious contagion such as obesity, a heart disease, diabetes or generally over 60 years of age.
For MHRA, Molnupiravir is a “safe and effective” drug, capable of reducing the danger of hospitalization for people affected by even moderate forms of Covid-19 who have at the same time a condition of extra risk. It works by interfering with the internal replication of the coronavirus. Administration, in the foreseen cases, is recommended as quickly as possible after a positive test, and in any case within 5 days
Covid: ok Gb antiviral pill, government rejoices, first in the world
Minister Javid, ‘it is a historic day for our country’
LONDON – “Today is a historic day for our country” in the fight against the pandemic, “because the United Kingdom becomes the first country in the world to have approved an antiviral against Covid-19 that can be taken at home”. Thus Sajid Javid, Minister of Health of the government of Boris Johnson, in the first hot comment on the formalization of the green light of the British drug agency (Mhra) – given today in advance of all – to the use of the ‘anti Covid pill’ molnupiravir made by the American pharmaceutical giant Merck.
It is a medicine destined to “change things for the most vulnerable and immunosuppressed patients, for whom this revolutionary treatment may soon be prescribed,” said Javid. The government of Great Britain, where about 140,000 deaths have been counted since the beginning of the pandemic and where the infections fueled by the Delta variant have resumed traveling in recent weeks at about 40,000 a day, albeit with a much less serious impact on deaths and hospitalizations compared to the pre-vaccine waves of the pandemic, he has so far secured 250,000 packs of molnupiravir, compared to 50,000 in a European country of more or less equal size like France.
A tool considered essential in London to contribute – together with vaccinations, in particular to the third booster doses already being administered on the island to all over 50s, to the vulnerable and to health personnel or social services – to try to contain the effect of the seasonal rebound of infections on hospitalizations without restoring the bulk of the restrictions: revoked in England (compulsory mask included) as of July 19 with a wide popular consensus and public opinion.