Paxlovid treatment has not provided any conclusive evidence to the expert committee from the Indian Council of Medical Research for inclusion in national guidelines for Covid 19 treatment. Samiran Panda, head of Epidemiology and infectious diseases at ICMR stated that an ICMR task force meeting was converged last week. The meeting was conducted to discuss the merits of the WHO recommended drug for inclusion in the guidelines. However, no merits were seen in the treatment program, and no changes were made to the existing guidelines.

He added that experts are awaiting the results of the trials and will review the data as it comes. Earlier, Molnupiravir failed to convince the committee due to its safety concern even after the EUA approval from the DCGI committee.

Paxlovid was recommended by the global health regulatory body for reducing the risk of hospitalization in Covid patients by 85%. However, WHO added that it should not be administered to patients at low risk of hospitalization as the benefits are negligible. Hyderabad-based Hetero labs were licensed to manufacture the generic version of the Pfizer drug that will be launched soon.