These are the companies manufacturing COVID-19 drug Remdesivir in India

• US-based drug manufacturer, Gilead earlier announced non-exclusive voluntary licensing agreements with Indian pharmaceutical companies including Cipla, Hetero, Dr. Reddy's Laboratories and others.
• The agreements allow these companies to manufacture remdesivir for distribution in 127 countries.
• Indian pharmaceutical company, Hetero has priced the drug at ₹5,400, whereas Cipla said the drug would be priced below ₹5,000.

While the Trump administration is hoarding up the stock of antiviral drug remdesivir from US-based Gilead Sciences for the next three months, leaving hardly any stock of the key Covid-19 drug for the rest of the world— but this might not be something that India has to worry about.

To expand the supply of remdesivir drug, Gilead earlier announced non-exclusive voluntary licensing agreements with Indian pharmaceutical companies.

Remdesivir is considered a key drug in the fight against Covid-19 as a randomised clinical trial conducted with the drug on 1,063 patients over 60 centres across US, Europe and Asia demonstrated faster time to clinical recovery in Covid-19 infected patients.

The agreements allow these companies to manufacture remdesivir for distribution in 127 countries.
Under the licensing agreements, the companies have a right to receive a technology transfer of the Gilead manufacturing process for Remdesivir to enable them to scale up production more quickly. The licensees can also set their own prices for the generic product they produce, while they are still subjected to regulatory approval from authorities.

Earlier last week India's top drug regulator had given the nod to Cipla and Hetero for marketing authorisation of antiviral drug Remdesivir only for "restricted emergency use" on COVID-19 patients. Hetero has priced the drug at ₹5,400, whereas Cipla said the drug would be priced below ₹5,000.

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