White House Warns Pfizer Pill Won’t Be Widely Available

The White House has dimmed optimism over the Omicron batter after the US Food and Drug Administration approved a pair of pills from Pfizer and Merck to treat Covid-19.

The White House has warned it will take more than six months to fulfil its initial order for Pfizer’s antiviral Covid-19 pill, as officials damped speculation the drug could immediately turn the tables on the pandemic.

Two years after the first reported cases of COVID-19 and one year after the first vaccine was administered, there’s new hope for ending the pandemic, in the form of antiviral pills that can be taken at home.

Drug maker Pfizer’s recently announced antiviral COVID-19 pill – which would be sold as Paxlovid – showed promising results, with a near 90% efficacy in preventing hospitalizations and deaths in high-risk patients.

Lab data also suggested the drug retained its effectiveness against the fast-spreading Omicron variant, Reuters reported.

Whereas previous antiviral treatments for COVID-19 had to be administered intravenously in hospital, the new antivirals are heralded as a ‘game-changer’ in treating the disease, because people can take them at home.

So, what other antiviral pills are in the works, how do they work, who can use them and how effective are they against COVID-19?

The EU has just cleared Pfizer’s antiviral COVID pill for use as soon as possible after diagnosis – or within five days of symptoms starting – among patients suffering severe forms of infection. But the drug can’t be used if the patient requires supplemental oxygen, Reuters reports.

The advice from drugs regulator the European Medicines Agency comes despite the medicine not having completed its full review for regulatory approval.

Paxlovid works by blocking the SARS-CoV-2 virus’ protease – a viral enzyme that cuts up the long virus polyprotein into smaller pieces in order to replicate.

Pfizer expects the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to authorize Paxlovid for use in high-risk patients soon and is in talks with the UK and “most of the major regulatory agencies globally”, Pfizer Chief Scientific Officer Mikael Dolsten added.