The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety said it has granted emergency approval for Gilead Sciences’ remdesivir to be used as Covid-19 treatment.

The regulator said it decided so to allow the import of the investigational Covid-19 drug, and that the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) would discuss the import of the medicine with related government agencies and Gilead Sciences Korea.

The nation has a special system to import an unauthorized drug to deal with a crisis in public health, such as an outbreak of a pandemic. Under the system, the food and drug safety minister can import a drug without a domestic license. Recently, the KCDC’s New Infectious Disease Central Clinical Committee requested the food and drug ministry to import redeliver for local Covid-19 patients.

The ministry went through the review of the National Essential Drug Stable Supply Council and made the final decision to import it.

“It was meaningful that remdesivir has shortened the treatment period in severe patients, and we needed to secure additional treatment options,” an official at the food and drug ministry said. “We also considered that the U.S., Japan, and the U.K. also allowed remdesivir to be used in the Covid-19 pandemic situation.”

He added that the government would work closely with Gilead Science Korea to import the drug as soon as possible.

kym@docdocdoc.co.kr

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