
USA buys up world stock of remdesivir - Max-20
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/30/us-buys-up-world-stock-of-key-covid-19-drug
======
kstenerud
"The drug, which was invented for Ebola but failed to work, is under patent to
Gilead, which means no other company in wealthy countries can make it."

Sorry, but if the one blessed company with the patent can't keep up with
demand, and millions are going to die because there are patent restrictions,
then ignore the patent laws and save some lives. It wouldn't look too good if
the American government tried to stop it, essentially saying "It's against the
law to save their lives, and we're going to punish you for saving them."

~~~
Consultant32452
The last studies I saw showed Remdesivir didn't actually save lives. Unless
some very different studies have come out, this is just a politically
connected pharma company using the pandemic to get a fat check from the US
government. This is just your standard every day corruption.

~~~
plicense
One of my friends is an anaesthetist dealing with Covid patients day in day
out in India. She works for a Government hospital and they started trying
Remdesivir 3 days ago. She said all three patients that they have given the
drug to have died of arrest - she does insist though that its not because of
the drug but she was saying that it isn't improving things if the patient is
in late stages of Covid.

~~~
koheripbal
This is a worthless 2nd hand hearsay anecdote.

Remdesivir has a _minor_ beneficial impact when delivered VERY EARLY.

No need to spread FUD when there's clinical data available.

~~~
dralley
>Remdesivir has a minor beneficial impact when delivered VERY EARLY.

There's still a couple of problems though:

* It has to be delivered by IV drip

* It's in short supply

* It's expensive

Which means that realistically, the only way to get a positive impact from it
would be to send high-risk patients who were very likely to have just been
exposed to the hospital for the injection. Even then, the risk-value
proposition does not seem that great.

~~~
koheripbal
None of these three points is the bottleneck. It's still easy to give someone
an IV early on if they're in a high-risk group, it's not in _that_ short
supply, and at ~$2500 per treatment regimen it's not _that_ expensive compared
to an extended hospital stay.

The bottleneck is that it's only slightly effective.

------
londons_explore
The drug that looked very promising for the last pandemic, yet turned out to
have no benefit, and now looks very promising as a treatment for this
pandemic...

Smells to me like someone in the remdesivir marketing department is doing very
well... Are there any scientific studies that don't have vested interests and
show it's a good treatment?

~~~
aaaxyz
This smells an awful lot like the Tamiflu story. Rumsfeld was chairman of
Gilead until he was nominated as Secretary of Defense. He refused to sell his
shares in the company and thus was forced to leave the room whenever
discussions that might impact the company happened. A few years later the
Pentagon starts stockpiling billions of dollars worth of Tamiflu. By the time
Rumsfeld left the white house, Gilead shares were up from $7 in 2001 to $67 in
2006.

~~~
koheripbal
I'm confused. Are you saying he had an ulterior motive? Tamiflu is effective
when given early. The stockpiles (which I doubt amounted to the billions) were
for the general US population in case of a super-flu. ...so it was a good
idea.

------
kleiba
Interestingly, Gilead apparently has a standing agreement with Europe to
deliver remdesivir. It should be interesting to see how this agreement can be
fulfilled if 100% of all doses have already been sold to the U.S.

Currenly, remdesivir is not approved for the treatment of COVID-10 in the EU,
but a decision along these lines is expected this week.

------
somurzakov
1\. remdesivir is not a cure for COVID and not as valuable to the rest of the
world. We need vaccine 2\. there is plenty of generic remdesivir in India

~~~
kleiba
_2\. there is plenty of generic remdesivir in India_

How does this go together with the claim that "Remdesivir is patented by
California-based Gilead"?

~~~
Tuna-Fish
> How does this go together with the claim that "Remdesivir is patented by
> California-based Gilead"?

India does not recognize patents on medicine.

See, for example: _India: Patents And The Indian Pharmaceutical Industry_ [1]

> With regard to pharmaceuticals, in the case of substances intended for use
> or capable of being used as food, drugs or medicines or substances produced
> by chemical processes, patents are granted only for the processes of
> manufacture of such substances and not for the substances themselves. Hence,
> pharmaceutical products are currently not granted patent protection under
> Indian law.

(And note that the "process of manufacture of such substances" is in practice
interpreted so tightly that it covers very little.)

[1] [https://www.mondaq.com/india/patent/865888/patents-and-
the-i...](https://www.mondaq.com/india/patent/865888/patents-and-the-indian-
pharmaceutical-industry)

~~~
belltaco
I think that law was changed in 2005 to allow product patents.

~~~
Tuna-Fish
The law might have been changed, but the practice of the law has not. India
still does not honor practically any foreign patents on medicine.

~~~
somurzakov
this practice helped so many people from low-income countries survive form
life-threatening conditions by just importing drugs from India. A relative of
mine from a very low income country got Hepatitis C treatment, thanks to
India.

------
pmontra
According to the article 500,000 doses are the production of July, and 90% of
August and September. Three full months would be 500,000 / 2.80 * 3 = 535,714
doses. A full treatment is made of six doses. There are 89,285 treatments in
there. Less than 30,000 per month. Too bad for the rest of the world that all
of them will happen in the USA but they are way too few to matter globally.
Split them proportionally with the population and how many of them are going
to be assigned to any European country? Maybe we need a x10 in the production
or more. Better, local production, which I understand is neither quick nor
easy.

~~~
s1artibartfast
Gilead is not the only producer because it has licensed numerous other
companies to manufacture the product.

See this post:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23700736](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23700736)

------
obilgic
If there is already alternative suppliers of this drug in India (as claimed by
the article) under generic brands, can't they do a licensing deal for the drug
and use that production while still not ignoring patent laws?

can't tell if this is a supply chain (production) problem or patent laws
dilemma.

~~~
olliej
I think the problem is that gilead has already announced that they’re planning
on charging something in the order of $3k per treatment, which won’t work in
most of the world, and is a sure fire way to get countries to start asking
questions about the value proposition of drug patents.

Basically if you have a company in India willing to manufacture for say $200,
Gilead will still charge the same amount, so licensing is likely to end up
being at cost for 3rd party manufacturers with all profits going to Gilead.

But if Gilead does do that then a whole lot of countries will suddenly start
asking why they’re having to pay so much to a US company that isn’t
manufacturing the drug, and is getting a 80-90% cutof the revenue.

It’s better for gilead to try to maintain a veneer if “quality productions
costs this much” in order to justify their pricing.

~~~
s1artibartfast
Most drugs have different prices in different countries so this is nothing
new. Also, My understanding is that 3rd party manufactures are not paying any
royalties to Gilead, which is very generous and they should be applauded.

------
cannedslime
The wonder drug that supposedly can cut two whole days off a case! Wow I am
surely sad that MY goverment didn't hoard all those pills, I mean they are
only 2000USD per treatment...

First the US buys all the chloroquin, now this. Next they will come for all
our sugar pills too!

------
nscalf
I thought studies include Remdesivir and Hydroxycloroquine showed negative
results. Why would we be buying up Remdesivir when Dexamethasone is the new
hot drug with good clinical results?

~~~
DanBC
Remdesivir reduces hospital stay but does not reduce mortality. It costs a lot
and is hard to make.

Dexamethasone is cheap, easy to make, and reduces mortality. We don't want
remdesivir, which is why you're not seeing regulatory action to seize control
of the rights.

[https://www.nihr.ac.uk/news/first-drug-to-reduce-
mortality-i...](https://www.nihr.ac.uk/news/first-drug-to-reduce-mortality-in-
hospitalised-patients-with-respiratory-complications-of-covid-19-found/25061)

------
mmargerum
The rest of the world already uses HCQ + Zinc prophylactically for about $20
instead. The pharma complex did a great job along with their zombie mob of
amrchair biochemists (the ones downvoting me to hades right now) of
discrediting HCQ with BS studies of almost dead people with 10x the normal
dose of HCQ without Zinc. All HCQ is in this protocol is a Ionophore to get
the zinc into the cells. Lancet had to retract one of the studies which they
almost never do.

------
mindhash
Recently read about This. theoretically doesn’t look like the cure

[https://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2020/06/29/how-remdesivir-
wor...](https://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2020/06/29/how-remdesivir-works-and-
why-its-not-the-ultimate-coronavirus-killer/)

------
SambalOelek
After working in the emergency room for three years now, I can firmly say no
treatment even comes close to prevention.

------
danielfoster
The optics of this are terrible and the US should be working with other
countries. But my guess is even if the US worked with Europe on distribution
>90% of it would go to the US anyway. The need stateside is exponentially
greater.

My guess is that Gilead played Trump and will now backtrack to make a
licensing deal so that the EU can produce its own at a lower price.

There’s nothing stopping Gilead from allowing more licensing now that it has
squeezed all it can from its best customer.

------
coding123
That's OK. Apparently HCQ works too.

------
pnako
The good news is that the drug that actually works is a generic one.

------
stoneglyph
This is a terrible waste of money. Hydroxychloroquine is less expensive, seems
to be more effective according to the research, and backed by more science.
You just have to look beyond your mainstream media to find the truth.

~~~
dralley
Hydroxychloroquine is _not_ effective, but Remdesivir is not very effective
either, so I would agree that it's a terrible waste of money.

------
mmm_grayons
Sounds like the Guardian isn't happy its home country got out-bid. Did it
expect that America would buy less of a potentially life-saving drug,
effectively prioritizing the welfare of foreigners over her own? I'd expect
any government to act in such a manner.

~~~
stunt
I agree media is making a big deal out of this.

But, would our reaction be still the same if Guardian's headline said China or
Russia did this? Probably not. Perhaps we would even talk about putting new
sanctions.

I think the right move would be allowing other companies to produce enough of
it. If that means financially supporting Gilead, let's do that. Then nobody
has to take all the stockpile.

~~~
mmm_grayons
> But, would our reaction be still the same if Guardian's headline said China
> or Russia did this? Probably not. Perhaps we would even talk about putting
> new sanctions.

Nope. There are about a billion other reasons both should be sanctioned to the
point of embargo, but this isn't one. Nations have been fighting each other
for resources for months now. That's to be expected in a high-demand, low-
supply environment where each wants to save as many of her citizens as
possible, and I wouldn't blame China or Russia for taking similar actions. For
instance, I don't really blame China for having restricted exports of PPE
because of greater need at home. I'd rather America get her hands on more
stuff, but I'd expect any competent government to act in the interests of her
citizens and so can't fault China (at least, not for this).

> I think the right move would be allowing other companies to produce enough
> of it. If that means financially supporting Gilead, let's do that. Then
> nobody has to take all the stockpile.

This is definitely a good approach, but this drug is pretty hard to make, so
I'm not sure another company could just start making it easily [0]. However,
Gilead has already been working with partner companies to ramp up production
[1], which will allow them to benefit from all the work Gilead has put in to
figuring out how to produce it at scale.

[0]: [https://www.acsh.org/news/2020/03/26/problem-remdesivir-
maki...](https://www.acsh.org/news/2020/03/26/problem-remdesivir-making-
it-14665)

[1]: [https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/30/gileads-remdesivir-
has-s...](https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/30/gileads-remdesivir-has-seen-
success-against-the-coronavirus-now-the-company-has-to-make-enough-to-supply-
the-world/)

