Eskayef Pharmaceuticals Limited, one of the leading drug manufacturing companies of the country, received approval to market remdesivir, an effective drug for treating coronavirus. The drug administration approved the product today. After getting approval, Eskayef has already delivered this medicine to 13 hospitals of the country. The brand name for remdesivir manufactured by Eskayef is ‘Remivir’.
“We have given permission to Eskayef for marketing and distribution of the drug. The pharmaceutical company can now distribute the drug for Covid-19 treatment to authorised government-run and private hospitals,” said Major General Mahbubur Rahman, director general of Directorate General of Drug Administration.
Eskayef’s formulation scientists began working on remdesivir from mid-March. The pharma completed all production processes in the first week of May. After necessary tests and procedures, the drug administration allowed it to be marketed from today.
Simeen Hossain, Managing Director and CEO of Eskayef Pharmaceuticals Limited, said Eskayef wants to serve the people of Bangladesh to tackle coronavirus. “Eskayef is working to make the treatment for the virus readily available. It produced remdesivir with the same goal,” she added.
The drug, developed by the US company Gilead Sciences Inc, has received worldwide response due to successful results in initial clinical trials in treating coronavirus disease. Later US FDA, Japanese Ministry of Health and European Medicines Agency approved remdesivir for emergency use in the treatment of Covid-19.
Remdesivir has so far shown the highest rate of success against coronavirus or COVID-19. Gilead’s own experiments have shown that the use of this drug has improved the condition of the patients. This drug is to be injected intravenously. Its dose depends on the severity of the disease. Severely ill patients may need 5 or 10-day doses for the purpose of treatment.
Eskayef Pharmaceuticals Limited, one of the organisations of Transcom Group led by industrialist Latifur Rahman, has been producing medicines for 30 years. The company has been exporting medicines to 30 countries in Europe, Australia, Africa and Asia.
