Anti-covid pill: the Gates foundation invests to help poor countries get it

The conspiracy theories targeting the American billionaire are not about to end.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced on Wednesday an investment of at least $ 120 million to facilitate access for poor countries to the anti-covid pill from the Merck laboratory.

Molnupiravir would greatly reduce the risk of hospitalization and death if taken within the first few days of infection.

This treatment with tablets, which is therefore easy to administer, offers a much awaited alternative to vaccines, in particular for countries experiencing difficulties in accessing the latter.

Its clearance is currently being assessed by the US Medicines Agency (FDA) and Merck plans to manufacture the doses needed for 10 million treatments by the end of the year.

Priority to the rich?

Problem: Much of it is likely to return to wealthy countries, as was the case with vaccines.

“The global supply (of vaccines) has been bought by the rich countries,” says Trevor Mundel, president of the foundation's global health division.

“We have to prevent this from happening again.

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Some generics "have said they can easily produce 10 million treatments per month, but the problem is they probably won't do it until they see what the demand is and who will pay," he says.

“This is what we want to speed up, we don't want them to wait.

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Read also Anti-Covid treatments: "We can be confident about the first authorizations this fall"

The money invested by the Gates Foundation will be used in part to encourage the production of generics of the drug by companies, especially Indian companies, to which Merck has already granted a license.

It also plans to invest part in communication programs around the use of this drug, so that it is known in these countries and that it is used appropriately.

Be careful though not to claim victory too early.

Tuesday, the professor of infectious diseases at the University Hospital of Rennes, Pierre Tattevin calmed, in the columns of the Parisian, the expectations placed in molnupiravir, believing that it was still too early to speak of effectiveness.