Dec 6, Reuters -- Drugmaker Merck Co announced on Monday that it was working with Thermo Fisher Scientific to make its experimental COVID 19 pill at the medical device maker's site in Whitby, Ontario.
The site will produce the drug, molnupiravir, for distribution in Canada and the United Kingdom, as well as markets in the European Union, Asia Pacific and Latin America.
The Ontario site is one of three manufacturing sites in the world for the pill, which is being developed with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics.
The government of Canada has secured access to 500,000 courses of molnupiravir in 2022, with options for up to 500,000 more pending the country's health regulator's approval.
The drugmaker said it had filed the final molnupiravir real-time application for approval in Canada last month. In November, the UK approved the conditional approval of molnupiravir, branded as Lagevrio.
The company had entered into a pact with the U.S. government to supply as many as 5 million courses of the antiviral at a price of $700 per course.
Merck is waiting for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to make a decision after the panel of independent advisers voted to approve the pill's authorization.