The Facts
A new UK study that tested 25k vaccinated COVID patients revealed that the antiviral drug molnupiravir, produced by Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD), reduced the recovery time from the disease.
Molnupiravir is the first antiviral medication for COVID that can be taken in pill form and was approved by UK medicines regulators in November, with the nation purchasing 480k courses.
The Spin
Narrative A
The PANORAMIC study definitively shows that molnupiravir and similar antiviral drugs are essentially useless and shouldn't be approved by health regulators. While it undeniably has some benefits, they're overwhelmingly outweighed by the drug's cost. During a pandemic that has taken millions of lives across the globe, governments can't afford to waste money and resources on drugs that don’t fully work.
Narrative B
While the PANORAMIC study didn't reveal molnupiravir to be a magic cure to end the pandemic, its findings show that the drug has many benefits. COVID hospitalizations are already very low (0.8%), so the detractors are objecting over a very small subset of patients. On the positive side, speeding up COVID recovery is a massive success for the vast majority of patients, and we should be happy that molnupiravir does just that.