After the vaccines, the world welcomes a new arsenal against Covid-19. The good thing is, you don’t need to go through the needles. It’s just a pill to be swallowed.
That’s the good news.
Pfizer has developed the drug called Paxlovid which experts considered as a big step to efforts towards treatment of Covid.
This means, we are moving towards treating Covid with medication. Aside from Pfizer’s Paxlovid, there have been tests and usage of other drugs like Ivermectin and MRK.N.
Last December, the Philippines approved emergency use of Merck & Co Inc’s (MRK.N) COVID-19 treatment pill for adult patients at risk of developing severe illness as it tries to boosts the country’s arsenal of drugs to fight new variants. The approval of the treatment pill came along with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for children aged 5-11.
Last October, the Food and Drug Administration allowed 31 Philippine hospitals to use Merck’s molnupiravir, the world’s first oral antiviral medication for COVID-19, under a compassionate use permit even before approval for its wider use.
Before that, the country also made tests of the controversial drug Ivermectin. President Rodrigo Duterte, however, has left it to the doctors to use ivermectin to their patients. Making it a “judgment call.”
The signs are imminent and it’s a welcome relief to see science eventually catch up on the virus.
