Benzinga | Nov 9, 2021 11:28AM EST

Merck and Ridgeback Announce U.S. Government To Purchase 1.4M Additional Courses Of Molnupiravir, An Investigational Oral Antiviral Medicine, For Treatment Of Mild-To-Moderate COVID-19 For ~$1B

Merck (NYSE:MRK), known as MSD outside the United States and Canada, and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics today announced that the United States government will exercise two of its options to purchase a total of 1.4 million additional courses of molnupiravir, an investigational oral antiviral medicine, if the medicine is granted Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) or approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), for approximately $1 billion. With these exercised options, the U.S. government has now committed to purchase a total of approximately 3.1 million courses of molnupiravir, for approximately $2.2 billion, between authorization and early 2022. The U.S. government also has the ability to purchase more than 2 million additional courses through further options that remain in the contract. Merck is developing molnupiravir in collaboration with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics.