COVID-19: India bans export of Remdesivir drug, injection as coronavirus cases surge

The Centre banned the export of Remdesivir and its active pharmaceutical ingredients as the demand for anti-viral drug Remdesivir has surged.

New Delhi: As India experiences a second wave of novel coronavirus infections, the demand for anti-viral drug Remdesivir has surged too. The Centre on Sunday (April 11, 2021) banned the export of Remdesivir and its active pharmaceutical ingredients. 

"In light of the above, Government of India has prohibited the exports of Injection Remdesivir and Remdesivir Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) till the situation improves," the health ministry said in a statement.

As many as seven Indian companies have licensed the drug from US-based Gilead Sciences, with an installed capacity of about 3.9 million units per month.

Additionally, the Centre has taken the following steps to ensure easy access of hospital and patients to Remdesivir:

1. All domestic manufactures of Remdesivir have been advised to display on their website, details of their stockists/distributors to facilitate access to the drug.

2. Drugs inspectors and other officers have been directed to verify stocks and check their malpractices and also take other effective actions to curb hoarding and black marketing. The State Health Secretaries will review this with the Drug Inspectors of the respective States/UTs.

3. The Department of Pharmaceuticals has been in contact with the domestic manufacturers to ramp up the production of Remdesivir.

The States and UTs have been advised that these steps should be communicated to all hospitals, both in public and private sector, and their compliance will be monitored.

Meanwhile, India on Sunday added 1,52,879 new COVID-19 cases that took the country's active count to over 11 lakh, as per the official data released by the Union Health Ministry.

As per a report by ANI India is expected to get five additional vaccine manufacturers apart from current manufactures Covishield and Covaxin. It comes as a part of scaling up the vaccine production as more and more states flag COVID-19 vaccine doses shortage.