Belgium to buy courses of Pfizer, Merck COVID pills

Pfizer's regimen is three pills in the morning and three pills at night. Merck's drug is taken as four pills in the morning and four at night.

The EU drug regulator has not authorised either, but has issued advice on how to use both as emergency treatments, as the bloc grapples with an exponential rise in cases driven by the highly contagious Omicron variant of the coronavirus.

The spokesman did not reply to a request to indicate how much Belgium had agreed to pay, and did not say when the country expected to receive the first courses.

Late in December France said it had cancelled its order for 50,000 courses of molnupiravir after the company released data in late November suggesting its drug was markedly less effective than thought, reducing hospitalisations and deaths in its clinical trial of high-risk individuals by about 30% read more .

Pfizer said Paxlovid showed near 90% efficacy in preventing hospitalisations and deaths in high-risk patients, and lab data suggests the drug retains its effectiveness against the fast spreading Omicron variant of the coronavirus.

Read also: Pfizer COVID drug Paxlovid gets approval in Britain