Annual sales of COVID-19 pills will easily bring in $2 billion (150 billion rubles), if approved by the United States, the chief executive of Japanese company Shionogi & Co. said on February 27, Channel NewsAsia reported.
“If you kill the virus quickly and abruptly enough, the lower the likelihood of COVID in the long run. This is our hypothesis, but we have to test it.”— explained CEO Isao Teshirogi.
Last year, Shionogi sold 2 million doses of Xocova, once a day for five days, to the Japanese government for 100 billion yen ($740 million).
Teshiroga said the drug could be approved in South Korea and China starting next month, while in the US the company hopes to get approval by the end of 2024.
Xocova’s representatives, based on interim research results, argue that taking the pill may reduce a patient’s chances of developing COVID in the long term.
As a reminder, Xocova, a protease inhibitor similar to COVID-19 drugs being developed by Pfizer and Merck & Co, received emergency approval from Japanese regulatory authorities in November, making it the first oral treatment for Japan for COVID-19.
Source: Rossa Primavera
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