Dan O’Day, CEO of Gilead Sciences, said on Monday that the company had donated its entire supply of remdesivir to the US government to dish out to hospitals across the country
The CEO of Gilead Sciences, the company that makes the promising drug remdesivir, says it will be available to treat COVID-19 patients as early as this week after receiving approval from the FDA.
The drug showed promising results in a study of more than 1,000 people around the world and has been touted as one of the first steps in reopening the economy.
Scientists found that patients who were given it recovered 31 percent faster than those who did not and that the mortality rate among recipients was around three percent lower; it was 8 percent in the drug recipients and 11.6 percent in placebo patients.
In an interview with Face The Nation on CBS on Sunday, Gilead CEO Dan O’Day said the company had donated its entire supply of the drug to the government to roll out to hospitals across the US and that it will also send some overseas.
‘We intend to get that to patients in the early part of this next week, beginning to work with the government, which will determine which cities are most vulnerable and where the patients are that need this medicine,’ O’Day said.
Stocks for the company rose last week after the results of the study were announced by Dr. Tony Fauci, the White House’s foremost coronavirus expert.
O’Day said that the company had now donated 1.5million vials of it to the government.
Depending on the length of a patient’s treatment, the supply should cater to between 100,000 and 200,000 people, O’Day said.
The drug, which is ordinarily used in Ebola cases, was effective in a study of more than 1,000 people. Those who got it recovered 31 percent faster than those who were given a placebo
Gilead’s share price has risen since its potential success in treating the virus was first reported at the start of the year
‘We did that because we acknowledge and recognize the human suffering, the human need here and want to make sure that nothing gets in the way of this getting to patients,’ he said.
It is now up to the government to determine where to send the doses and how much each area needs.
It is unclear when more will be ready. O’Day said that the company ramped up production of it in January but did not explain what prompted them to boost manufacturing.
There were scarcely any known COVID-19 cases in the US in January.
President Trump claims China tried to cover up how deadly it was late last year and that it may have even been created in a lab and escaped.
When the US should have known about it much less responded to it to prepare is now a source of political contention.
‘We are now firmly focused on getting this medicine to the most urgent patients around the country here in the United States.
Dr. Fauci said last week that while the drug was not full-proof nor was it a cure, it proved for the first time that the virus could be ‘stopped’ with treatment.
Doctors who took part in the study now want to examine how to use it with other medications to give patients ‘tailored’ courses of treatment.
It comes amid more promising remarks from President Trump that a vaccine could be ready by ‘the end of the year’.
White House coronavirus expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said last week the drug was ‘proof’ the virus could be stopped by medicine
Trump was speaking at a virtual town hall with Fox News on Sunday when he gave the prediction.
He said the US was working with the UK and Australia to quickly develop a vaccine and that he ‘doesn’t care’ which country makes it first, so long as it works.
‘We think we’ll have a vaccine by the end of this year. And we’re pushing very hard. We’re building supply lines now and we don’t even have the final vaccine,’ Trump said.
He pointed to Johnson & Johnson as one company making a dent. ‘Many companies, I think, are close,’ he told Fox News hosts in a virtual town hall and said the US was working with the UK and Australia to develop it.
Admitting that it didn’t sound like his usual ‘America First’ rhetoric, Trump answered, ‘I don’t care,’ when asked how he would feel if another country developed a successful vaccine first.
‘I really just want to get a vaccine that works,’ the president said.
Last week, Dr. Fauci said ‘hundreds of millions’ of doses of a vaccine could be ready as early as January next year.
Among the companies that are developing vaccines is Moderna Inc. Its CEO dazzled the president during a roundtable with other pharmaceutical executives in March by claiming they could have a vaccine ready to enter phase two of a trial in ‘a few months’.
Johnson & Johnson is also developing a vaccine.