MSD Pharmaceuticals Pvt Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD), has signed non-exclusive voluntary licensing agreements with five established Indian generic manufacturers—Sun Pharmaceutical Industries, Cipla, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, Emcure Pharmaceuticals and Hetero Labs—to contract manufacture the covid-19 drug molnupiravir, according to news reports.
Molnupiravir is an investigational oral antiviral agent currently being studied in a Phase 3 trial for the treatment of non-hospitalised patients with confirmed COVID-19. MSD is developing molnupiravir in collaboration with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, CNBC-TV18 said.
"The scale of human suffering in India at this moment is devastating, and it is clear that more must be done to help alleviate it. These agreements, toward which we have been working as we have been studying molnupiravir, will help to accelerate access to molnupiravir in India and around the world," said Kenneth C. Frazier, chairman, and CEO, Merck & Co, Inc, US, according to the business channel.
