K'taka remdisivir supply to increase to 20K vials per day for next 5 days

The four companies which are supplying anti-viral remdisivir to the government have agreed to increase the supply to 20,000 vials for the next five days starting from May 6 (Thursday), said Deputy Chief Minister and State COVID task force head Dr CN Ashwatha Narayana, on Wednesday.

Addressing press conference Narayana said, "I have spoken to company heads of these four companies and put together, they have agreed to increase the supply to 20,000 vials. Till now these companies were supplying 10,000 vials in total per day."

He also informed, the companies have agreed to further increase the supply after May 9.

To curb any black marketing of remdisivir, he said the names of the patients for whom it is administered will be recorded and the names of those will be put in the public domain to ensure transparency.

"The triage of the COVID patients will be further strengthened in starting from the primary health care (PHC) level itself. The needed additional staff required for this will be deployed by roping in internees, final year graduation students and PG students of all the medical/paramedical courses," Narayana clarified.

The PHCs are also told to ensure enough stock of medical consumables such as masks, PPE kits, aprons, pulse oximeters etc, he informed.