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Available for over a year

With cases still rising in the US, sometimes by as many as 50,000 a day, the White House has announced it has secured 90% of existing supplies of an antiviral treatment, remdevisir, and the manufacturer, Gilead, is charging as much as $3,000 per treatment. Health economist Andrew Hill argues that in the midst of a medical emergency the drug should be offered at close to production cost, particularly as Gilead, the manufacturer involved, contributed very little to the drug's development. He outlines how drug production in places such as China or India could challenge this monopoly. Photo: A technician holds the anti-viral drug Remdesivir