This was supported by Giulia Grillo, former Minister of Health, who called Roberto Speranza into question following the EU agreement with the manufacturing company for the supply of the antiviral. Gilead's reply
Today editorial staff – 20 October 2020
The price of remdesivir, the company's antiviral drug Gilead proposed to treat Covid-19 patients and contracted by the EU with the Californian pharmaceutical company, it would be too high. This is why a parliamentary interpellation was addressed to the Minister of Health Roberto Speranza "to find out the criteria with which the EU agreement was defined for remdesivir, the first drug authorized on 25 June by the European Agency 
for medicines (Ema) for the treatment of Covid-19 ″.
How much does remdesivir cost?
It was to address it Giulia Grillo, former Minister of Health and member of the 5 Star Movement, explaining that "if the data collected through official acts of the European Parliament and primary press agencies are correct, it is not clear how it was possible to sign an agreement which provides for a price equal to 2,100 euros for a chemical synthesis medicine that the US company Gilead had created in the past years to eradicate the Ebola virus epidemic, whose production cost is estimated to be less than five euros for a five-day treatment cycle”.
According to former minister Giulia Grillo, the price defined in the agreement of 8 October last, for a supply equal to 500,000 treatments "is the same as that defined on 29 July, again at European level, for the treatment of around 30,000 treatments . As if that weren't enough, the agreement reached for 500,000 treatments was signed shortly before the World Health Organization announced the results of the 'Solidarity' study which would seem to show that Remdesivir has limited efficacy in patients' recovery times , but no statistically favorable outcome in terms of mortality”.
The EU had bought 500,000 doses of remdesivir
Let's take a step back. Even the European Union had bet on remdesivir. On October 8, the European Commission announced a contract with the pharmaceutical company Gilead for the purchase of 500,000 cycles of treatment with remdesivir (Veklury is the trade name), with the opportunity to increase the supply. Despite doubts about its effectiveness, remdesivir was the first drug to receive EU approval to treat severe cases of the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.
The WHO study on remdesivir
Then the cold shower. Hopes on the antiviral drug against Ebola also used in therapies against the coronavirus seem to be waning. Second a WHO study, remdesivir and three other existing drugs have not proved to be useful against Covid 19. "Trials on four drugs conducted on 11,000 patients in 30 countries - explained the WHO - show that these drugs appear to have little or no effect" on the survival and disease progression among hospitalized patients”. The United Nations health agency's Solidarity Trial involved remdesivir, the HIV treatment lopinavir/ritonavir, the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine and interferon, developed for multiple sclerosis.
Giulia Grillo, meanwhile, explains: "As also indicated in a document of the Parliamentary Budget Office on the governance of pharmaceutical expenditure, in the absence of a willingness on the part of drug manufacturers to contain prices, it may be necessary to intervene to rethink the patent system. I had embarked on this path by promoting the approval of the Resolution to improve the transparency of medicines markets at the 72nd World Health Assembly. I hope that Minister Roberto Speranza shares my opinion - he points out - also because we are approaching a debt/GDP ratio of around 160% and every euro, whatever the fund it comes from, must be used judiciously".
The replica of the pharmaceutical company Gilead
From February to June, Gilead “donated 1.5 million doses for patients around the world, including those in Italy, for programs of compassionate use, therapeutic use and in clinical trials. Despite the 
past and ongoing research investments, 16 studies currently in progress, and the company's $1 billion worth of manufacturing effort, the price of Veklury* (remdesivir) has been kept at a low and sustainable level for systems health care". This was clarified by the pharmaceutical company itself, producer of the antiviral remdesivir approved for the treatment of Covid-19, in response to the parliamentary interpellation presented by the former Minister of Health, Giulia Grillo.
Gilead claims to have "worked closely with global and Italian institutions since the beginning of the pandemic as partners to address the exceptional health needs". The company has “fixed a single price for remdesivir for all industrialized countries at $390 per vial and $2,340 for a 5-day course of treatment, well below the value the drug can generate for patients and systems. sanitary. In fact, the reduction in hospitalization times, in addition to representing direct cost savings, also allows hospital capacity to be freed up to treat more patients in a condition of limited resources such as the current one”, highlights the company in a note.
"Based on the most recent and verified scientific evidence", remdesivir allows to "reduce the recovery time from the disease from 5 to 7 days, thus reducing the time spent in the hospital and accelerating the return to normality, family and work".
the value of remdesivir, recalls Gilead, "it has been recognized by independent institutions such as the English Icer, according to which the reasonable price should be double that at which Gilead has chosen to propose it to the European Commission and to the health authorities of the countries with the highest pro- per capita, while negotiating long-term voluntary licenses with 9 generic drug manufacturers for production destined for distribution in 127 low-income countries. In conclusion, the company "is not aware of how these calculations were made, and certainly believes that the statement does not take into due consideration the complexity of the production process of this drug which, precisely because it is already extensively studied and in a state of the art of experimentation, it was possible to make it available to patients already at the outbreak of the pandemic free of charge"."
