An
HIV drug approved less than three years ago will be given to Botswana
patients as part of the biggest deal ever secured by drug maker
GlaxoSmithKline in Africa, Reuters reported.
This
is the first time that Tivicay, or dolutegravir, will be available as a
first-line treatment in a nationalized health care system in sub-Saharan
Africa.
Botswana
has the third highest HIV rate in the world after Lesotho and Swaziland
with 21.9 percent of adults infected, according to Avert.org. That’s a
lot less than in 2005, when 25.4 percent of Batswana adults had the
virus.
Botswana
was the first country in sub-Sahara to provide universal free
antiretroviral treatment to people with HIV, Avert reported. This
provided a model for other countries in the region to follow. New
infections decreased from 15,000 in 2005 to 9,100 in 2013, and AIDS-related
deaths were dramatically reduced from 14,000 in 2005 to 5,800 in 2013.
ViiV
Healthcare — a joint venture between the U.K. drug maker
GlaxoSmithKline, U.S.-based Pfizer and Japan’s Shionogi — made a
deal with the government of Botswana to provide treatment to patients
recently diagnosed with HIV, FinancialTimes reported.
About
75 percent of the world’s HIV-positive population lives in sub-Saharan
Africa, GlaxoSmithKline said.
The
World Health Organisation recommended dolutegravir as alternative first line
treatment in HIV patients in late 2015.
Dolutegravir
is the the second approved antiretroviral drug treatment by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration. The first, raltegravir (Isentress), was approved
in 2007, according to MedPageToday.
Dolutegravir
is regarded as an attractive alternative to raltegravir because it is given
once daily, at 50 milligrams, compared with 400 milligrams twice a day for the
older drug. It’s also approved for children 12 years and older who weigh
at least 40 kilograms.
“This
tender agreement is a great moment as part of our commitment to accelerating
access to our treatments in Africa,” said Dominique Limet, CEO of ViiV
Healthcare. “It will allow people living with HIV in Botswana to have access to
dolutegravir as part of a national test and treat initiative, locally referred
to as the ‘Treat All’ program. It is even more of an achievement for us as it
happens less than three years after the product was first approved and less
than one year after it was included in the WHO guidelines.”
Glaxo
co-founded ViiV Healthcare along with Pfizer in 2009 to pool research into HIV
medications, according to the Telegraph. At the time
of its 2013 approval, dolutegravir was hailed as a “very important milestone.”
In
addition to Botswana, ViiV Healthcare is involved in a new national
program in Lesotho to help children with HIV. The company recently extended a
licence agreement with the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) allowing the adult
formulation of dolutegravir to be eligible in all lower middle-income countries
including several in Africa.
The
U.N.’s Medicines Patent Pool enables generic versions of drugs to be
available in poor countries without royalty payments.
In
March, CEO Sir Andrew Witty said Glaxo would no longer seek patents for
medications launched in low-income or least-developed
countries, making the company’s latest drugs available to the world’s
poorest people at a fraction of the commercial price.
Botswana
is relatively wealthy by African standards, thanks to its diamond mines,
Reuters reported. No details were provided of the value of the deal with the
Botswana government.
Botswana’s very
high rates of HIV diagnosis, treatment, and viral
suppression are much better than most Western countries including the
U.S., according to a study published in March by the Harvard T.H. Chan
School of Public Health, ScienceDaily reported.
Glaxo Secures Largest-Ever Sub-Saharan Africa Deal For HIV Treatment In Botswana
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