Japan has following in the footsteps of the US by announcing plans to fast track a review in to the anti-viral drug Remdesivir.
Yesterday, the United States approved emergency use of the experimental treatment, which has shown to help some patients recover from coronavirus faster.
Remdesivir, produced by Gilead Sciences Inc, is the first drug shown to help fight Covid-19, which has infected more than 3.4 million people and killed over 242,000, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Japan Health Minister Katsunobu Kato says he plans to approve the drug’s use for domestic patients within a week, Reuters reported today.
“I’ve heard that Gilead Sciences will file for approval [in Japan] within days… I issued instruction so that we will be ready to approve it within a week,” he said.
Despite early success with containing the virus, cases in Japan have since soared to more than 14,000 with over 450 deaths.
After failing as a treatment for Ebola, Remdesivir has shown promise at treating Covid-19.
Nearly all of the patients in the ongoing trial have been taken off ventilators or discharged from hospital. (Source: Other)
Early trials by the University of Chicago have shown over 100 patients in an ongoing trial for the drug being taken off ventilators.
While Gilead has intended to distribute enough of the drug to treat 140,000 patients around the globe, the country would not be receiving enough to treat all their patients, according to Reuters.
Tokyo has had to resort to converting nearby hotels into temporary hospitals for mild to moderately ill patients, staffed with robots , to help free up hospital beds.
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