Pharma Industry Donating More than a Hundred Million Doses of Malaria Drug to Combat COVID-19, an Industrial Info Market Brief

"Donate" and "drug companies" are not often found in the same sentence. But, in this case, it is true, as several companies have offered up staggering amounts of the drug chloroquine (and other variations), a malaria drug developed in the 1930s, pending approvals on its effectiveness in combating the COVID-19 global scourge. Amneal, Bayer, Novartis, Mylan and Teva are among those pledging hundreds of millions of doses of the drug, which is not currently approved as a treatment for COVID-19, to governments and hospitals. That has not stopped the field use of the drug by desperate physicians and the launch of scores of clinical trials across the world. Anecdotal results have been promising, but firm dosing guidelines and projected outcomes have not yet been established. There has been a run on the drug in pharmacies across the world as scores of people secured prescriptions for its off-label use. New restrictions have popped up to safeguard the existing supply for testing and monitored use.