Pfizer CEO rules out generic COVID drug Paxlovid for China
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[January 10, 2023]
(Reuters) -Pfizer Inc is not in talks with Chinese authorities to
license a generic version of its COVID-19 treatment Paxlovid for use
there, but is in discussions about a price for the branded product,
Chief Executive Albert Bourla said on Monday.
Reuters reported on Friday that China was in talks with Pfizer to secure
a licence that will allow domestic drugmakers to manufacture and
distribute a generic version of the U.S. firm's COVID-19 antiviral drug
Paxlovid in China.
Referring to that report, Bourla, speaking at J.P. Morgan's healthcare
conference in San Francisco, said "We are not in discussions. We have an
agreement already for local manufacturing of Paxlovid in China. So we
have a local partner that will make Paxlovid for us, and then we will
sell it to the Chinese market."
Pfizer has a licensing agreement with the U.N-backed Medicines Patent
Pool (MPP) that allows 35 drugmakers around the world to make cheap
versions of Paxlovid and supply the treatment in 95 poorer countries.
That licence does not allow them to sell generic Paxlovid in China,
where infections have surged since December, prompting a severe shortage
of flu and COVID drugs.
A box of Paxlovid, used for a single course of treatment, is changing
hands for as much as 50,000 yuan ($7,313), according to local media
reports and social media posts, against the original price of around
2,000 yuan.
Bourla said the company had shipped thousands of courses of the
treatment in 2022 to China and in the past couple of weeks, had
increased that to millions.
On Sunday, China's Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA) said that
the country would not include Paxlovid in an update to its list of
medicines covered by basic medical insurance schemes as the U.S. firm
quoted a high price for the COVID-19 drug.
The drug is currently covered by China's broad healthcare insurance
scheme under temporary measures until the end of March.
Bourla said that talks with China on future pricing for the treatment
had broken off after China had asked for a lower price than Pfizer is
charging for most lower middle income countries.
"They are the second highest economy in the world and I don't think that
they should pay less than El Salvador," Bourla said.
The failure of the talks to include Pfizer in the list of medicines
covered by basic state health insurance generated heated discussions on
Chinese social media on Monday.
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Paxlovid, Pfizer's anti-viral medication
to treat the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), is displayed in this
picture illustration taken October 7, 2022. A morning and an evening
does consists of one white 100-milligram tablet of Ritonavir and two
pink 150-milligram tablets of PF-07321332. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay/Illustration
Some Chinese media reported that
Pfizer had lowered the price of Paxlovid to 600 yuan in the
negotiations, triggering a wave of criticism and questions on social
media as to why Chinese regulators had not accepted that price.
A separate report by financial magazine Caixin on Monday cited
unnamed sources as saying that Pfizer had not lowered its price
significantly beyond the 1,890 yuan it currently charges Chinese
hospitals.
Pfizer declined to comment on the Chinese media reports about the
price it quoted during the negotiations. NHSA did not immediately
reply to a Reuters request for comment on the negotiations.
China's state media Global Times accused Pfizer of trying to profit
from China's COVID battle in an opinion piece on Monday.
"It is not a secret that U.S. capital forces have already
accumulated quite a fortune from the world via selling vaccines and
drugs, and the U.S. government has been coordinating all along.
There is no so-called human right, but monopoly," it said.
"If they do care about it (the epidemic in China), why don't Pfizer
drop some pursuit of the profit, and cooperate with China with a
little more sincerity?"
Bourla said the removal from the list would not have an effect on
the company's business there until April and the company could end
up selling only to the private market in China.
Pfizer signed a deal in August for Chinese drugmaker Zhejiang Huahai
to produce Paxlovid in mainland China solely for patients there.
Bourla said production is gearing up in China and progress has been
made that may allow it to start manufacturing in the first half of
the year, ahead of its year-end internal estimate.
(Reporting by Michael Erman in New York, Brenda Goh in Shanghai,
Sophie Yu in Beijing; Editing by Miyoung Kim, Muralikumar
Anantharaman and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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