According to foreign media, pharmaceutical company Merck has granted a royalty-free permit for its promising COVID-19 pill to a United Nations-backed nonprofit organization in a deal that will allow the drug to be manufactured and sold cheaply in the world’s poorest countries, where coronavirus vaccines are in critically short supply.
The arrangement with the Medicines Patent Pool, an organization that strives to make medical treatment and technologies more accessible around the world, will allow companies in 105 countries, largely in Africa and Asia, to sub-license the antiviral pill’s formulation and begin manufacturing it.
