Just as quickly the Covid-19 virus spread like wildfire, so made every country’s desperate effort to find a cure for the same across the globe. Many researchers were able to identify those drugs that could minimize the ill-effects of the virus to some extent by either reducing the intensity of the symptoms or managing late-stage symptoms,. However, Paxlovid, a pill that Pfizer Inc. has produced, seems to prevent severe disease, taking the lead in the coronavirus treatment segment.
However, one of the crucial components of Pfizer’s antiviral drug is related to one of Merck’s drugs that it develops and is known as boceprevir. This drug was developed several years ago to counteract hepatitis C. This constituent makes up 20% of Paxlovid’s efficiency in fighting the virus or perhaps more, as researchers assess. But a vital patent of the larger molecule it is derived from still belongs to Merck.
Many laboratories have identified the potential of boceprevir, which is a protease inhibitor and was sold by Merck under the brand name Victrelis earlier. But over time, Merck was on the sideline as other developers started finding out ways to use it.
While Merck has sidelined the drug for long and others make profits, the essential part has led to Merck’s time of a Covid battle. Merck, Sanofi, and GlaxoSmithKline Plc are the few drugmakers that have not developed any coronavirus vaccine yet.
Bloomberg News also states that it is predicted that Pfizer alone will make $31 billion in revenue from the Covid vaccine in 2022. It will gain $17 billion more from the sale of Paxlovid in 2022, compared to Merck’s Covid pill Molnupiravir which will raise only $2.5 billion as per estimates Airfinity. On February 3rd, Merck reduced its upper-end forecast of 2022 of molnupiravir sales to $6 billion from its earlier forecast of $7 billion by the end of the year.
Merck continues to enjoy the key patent of boceprevir, and it will expire in 2024, as per the spokesperson. The spokesperson stated the adequate dose of boceprevir required to work as an antiviral against coronavirus was much more than what it was prescribed for indications, else it could have been used in a combination drug coupled with additional therapies so that the potency of the drug could be improved.
Bloomberg News also reports that the assessment has led Merck to explore elsewhere for treatment of coronavirus, and a portion of the company’s discovery is now added in the blockbuster pill of Pfizer.
However, Merck has not revealed why it has not investigated such combinations with boceprevir just as Pfizer did. As far as Paxlovid is concerned, it depends a lot on Merck’s patent status, how it is written, and the representation of the same in Pfizer’s blockbuster Covid pill.
