NEW DELHI: On Wednesday, Mansukh Mandaviya, Minister of State reviewed the production and availability of medicine Remdesivir which supposingly benefits Covid-19 patients. The minister met with the manufacturers of the Remdesivir drug and other stakeholders and set to increase its production and supply on lowest price.
The current total installed capacity of the seven manufacturers of Remdesivir is 38.80 lakh vials per month. Fast-track approval has been given for seven additional sites having the production capacity of 10 Lakh vials /month to six manufacturers. Another 30 lakh vials/month production is lined up. This would ramp up the production capacity for manufacturing to around 78 lakh vials/month.
As an additional measure, Remdesivir, API and formulation were placed under Export ban on 11.04.2021by DGFT to increase the supply of Remdesivir in the Domestic Market. On Government intervention, Remdesivir supplies of approximately 4 lakh vials meant for Export is being diverted by manufacturers to fulfil domestic requirement. EOU/SEZ units are also being enabled to supply to the domestic market.
Manufacturers of Remdesivir have volunteered to reduce the price to less than Rs 3500 by the end of this week in order to support the efforts against fighting the pandemic.
Manufactures of Remdesivir have been directed to give priority to fulfil hospital, institutional level supplies. Enforcement Authorities of States and Central Govt. have been directed by DCGI to take immediate action on incidence of black-marketing, hoarding and overcharging of Remdesivir.