The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has started on Monday a review of a potentially ground-breaking antiviral pill to treat COVID-19.
The EU’s medicines watchdog’s announcement raised hopes for an easy-to-administer treatment to reduce serious or deadly cases.
EMA’s human medicines committee (CHMP) has started a rolling review of the oral antiviral medicine molnupiravir… developed by Merck Sharp & Dohme in collaboration with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics for the treatment of Covid-19 in adults,” the European Medicines Agency said in a statement.
Preliminary results “suggest that the medicine may reduce the ability of SARS-CoV-2 to multiply in the body. It will thereby prevent hospitalisation or death in patients with Covid‑19,” the EMA said.
The move, which could eventually lead to authorisation on the European market, comes two weeks after Merck applied for emergency use in the US of the anti-coronavirus drug.
The WHO has earlier warned that a new coronavirus “variant of interest” named Mu, also known by its scientific name as B.1.621.
The health organisation said it closely monitors the new variant’s spread.
The mu SARS-CoV-2 strain first appeared in Colombia in January, as a “variant of interest.”
Since then, there have been “sporadic reports” of cases and outbreaks in South America and Europe.
Variants of interest have genetic changes that affect virus characteristics including transmissibility, disease severity and immune escape.
According to the WHO, variants of interest differ from variants of concern. The later can cause a decrease in effectiveness of public health measures, vaccines or therapeutics.
