FILE PHOTO: A Gilead Sciences, Inc. logo is seen outside the company headquarters in Foster City, California, USA. USA, May 1, 2018. REUTERS / Stephen Lam
(Reuters) – Gilead Sciences Inc’s (GILD.O) Antiviral remdesivir could be priced up to $ 5,080 per course based on the benefits shown in COVID-19 patients, a US drug pricing group suggested Wednesday. US, raising its previous recommendation to around $ 4,500.
However, the Boston-based Clinical and Economic Review Institute (ICER) suggested a lower price range of around $ 2,520 to $ 2,800, if the steroid dexamethasone were to be licensed for use in COVID-19.
The cheap and widely used steroid has been hailed as a breakthrough after it was found to reduce death rates in critically ill patients.
What Gilead could charge for remdesivir after his promised donations have run out has been a subject of intense debate as millions of infections emerge across the country. The virus has infected more than 2 million Americans and has killed more than 120,000.
Wall Street analysts say the drug could generate billions of dollars in revenue in the coming years, assuming the pandemic continues.
But pharmaceutical industry consultants and former regulators have suggested that Gilead would need to avoid the appearance of taking advantage of a global health crisis to make a profit.
Report by Saumya Sibi Joseph in Bangalore; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli
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