NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India on Sunday banned the export of antiviral drugs Remdesivir and its active pharmaceutical ingredients as demand rose due to record increases in COVID-19 infections and led to crippling deficiencies in many parts.
The new COVID-19 cases rose to 152,879 on Sunday, the sixth record increase in seven days, overwhelming hospitals in some regions. India, known as the world’s pharmacy, has already blocked major exports of coronavirus vaccines.
In addition to the Remdesivir ban “until the situation improves”, the health ministry said in a statement that manufacturers had been asked to intensify supplies.
Seven Indian companies have licensed the drug from Gilead Sciences, with an installed capacity of about 3.9 million units per month, for local use and exports to more than 100 countries.
The companies are: Cipla Ltd, Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd, Hetero Labs Ltd, Jubilant Life Sciences Ltd, Biocon Ltd’s Syngene, Zydus Cadila Healthcare Ltd and the Indian unit Mylan.
The World Health Organization issued a conditional recommendation in November against the use of Remdesivir in hospitalized patients, regardless of the severity of the disease, saying there was no evidence that the drug had improved survival and other outcomes in these patients.
However, many countries, including India, continued to use it.
India leads the world in the average daily number of new infections reported in more than two weeks, accounting for one in six infections reported globally each day, according to a Reuters report.
Deaths also rose, with the Ministry of Health reporting 839 deaths on Sunday – the highest in five months – bringing the total to 169,275.
India’s number of over 13.35 million cases is the third highest globally, behind only the US and Brazil.
BLACK MARKETING
India’s drug regulators and some state governments have expressed concern in recent days about hoarding and blackmailing Remdesivir, which in some cases is sold at more than 10 times the maximum retail price.
Social media posts on Sunday showed large queues of people in the western state of Gujarat waiting to buy Remdesivir injections for COVID-19 patients.
“Every day, the central government provides 50,000 injections of Remdesivir, but all are consumed,” Rajesh Tope, India’s most affected health minister in Maharashtra, told reporters this week. “Pharmacists and wholesalers could do black market and this needs to be verified.”
The federal health ministry has written to Maharashtra, which hosts the financial capital Mumbai, urging local authorities to improve COVID-19 testing and increase the workforce.
“Improving health workers, hiring contract health workers needs to be accelerated,” the letter from India’s first health bureaucrat said, citing an acute shortage of health workers in seven districts in Maharashtra.
Authorities blamed the reappearance of the virus mainly on crowds and reluctance to wear masks, even though election rallies and religious gatherings have continued in recent weeks.
Thousands of people gathered on the banks of the holy river Ganges in Haridwar on Sunday for prayers during the Kumbh Mela – where up to five million are expected on certain days.
Authorities have made it mandatory for all persons entering the area to take COVID-19 tests. But many devotees gathered on Sunday by the river without masks, in dense crowds.
Reporting by Devjyot Ghoshal and Krishna N. Das in New Delhi, edited by William Maclean