New vistas of Covid-19 research

US Pharmaceutical Company, Gilead Sciences has disclosed that it wants collaboration in the production of Rmdesvir with the pharmaceutical firms in Pakistan and India. It is an experimental antiviral medicine which was recently approved by the US Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) for the treatment of Covid-19 patients. Remdesivir has shown greater success rate in the treatment of the disease. The patients’ recovery rate was 30 percent faster than other drugs.

Earlier, Sinopharm Internation of China had sent a letter to the Ministry of National Health Services of Pakistan for mutual cooperation in the clinical trials of the anti-coronavirus vaccines and subsequent production. Similarly, Chinese Ambassador in Pakistan, while giving interview to a foreign TV Channel the other day, hinted in extending collaboration in the production of herbal medicines that gave wonderful results in the recovery of coronavirus infected patients in China. It remains to be seen how much time the bureaucracy of Ministry of National Health Services and Drugs Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) will consume in cutting the red tap to decide about the offers of US and Chines pharmaceutical companies for the production anti-coronavirus drugs and vaccines. The health policy of 1960 envisaged that foreign pharmaceutical companies will also set up raw material manufacturing plants in Pakistan. However, lack of coordination between the ministries of Production, Finance, National Health Services and DRAP hindered local production of raw material for medicines and establishment R&D facilities in the pharmaceutical industry.