Dr. Reddy's announced commercial availability of 2DG, an anti-Covid drug.
In the next weeks, the Hyderabad-based pharmaceutical company plans to make the medicine available in hospitals throughout metros and Tier 1 cities, before expanding coverage to the rest of India.
On Monday, Dr. Reddy's Laboratories announced the commercial launch of 2DG, an anti-Covid drug produced by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The anti-Covid medication was licensed for emergency use as an additional therapy to the standard of care in the treatment of coronavirus patients in hospital settings by the DRDO on June 1.
Dr. Reddy's 2-DG has a purity of 99.5 percent, and the maximum retail price of each sachet has been set at Rs 990, with a discounted pricing available to government institutions.
It should be emphasized that 2-DG was developed in partnership with Dr. Reddy's by the Institute of Nuclear Medicine & Allied Sciences (INMAS), a laboratory of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).
Clinical experiments have demonstrated that the medicine aids in the faster recovery of hospitalised patients and minimises the need for supplemental oxygen, according to the defense ministry. It limits virus multiplication by accumulating in virus-infected cells of patients and halting viral synthesis and energy production. According to the ministry, "this medication is unique in that it selectively accumulates in virally infected cells." It went on to say that a higher proportion of 2-DG patients had "RT-PCR negative conversion" and that the "drug will be of immense value" to Covid-19 sufferers.
Dr. Reddy's announces the commercial launch of 2DG™. Know more: https://t.co/mrrKxbKxQ8#COVID19 #2DG #DrReddys pic.twitter.com/K8RozCVtNj
— Dr. Reddy's (@drreddys) June 28, 2021
Between May and October 2020, phase-II trials on 110 patients revealed that the medicine was safe and improved the recovery of Covid-19 patients significantly.
Patients given 2-DG "showed faster symptomatic cure than Standard of Treatment (SoC) on several endpoints," according to the defense ministry, with a median difference of 2.5 days in reaching normalization of specified parameters when compared to the standard care regimen.
The 2DG medication comes in a sachet as a powder that must be dissolved in water before being used orally.
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