Pfizer officials stated on an earnings call that while Paxlovid’s first-quarter sales may seem to be low, there will be plenty more revenues in the next three months. Paxlovid, Big Pharma’s COVID-19 oral antiviral, may soon benefit from agreements in China and Europe, as per the company.
For the very first three months of 2022, Pfizer earned $25.7 billion in sales. When the pandemic haul from BioNTech-partnered vaccine Comirnaty plus oral antiviral Paxlovid is subtracted, operational revenue climbed by 2%, according to the company’s financial report. Revenue was a whopping 82% using COVID assets.
Pfizer has maintained its full-year revenue target of $98 billion to $102 billion. As per the business, Comirnaty is expected to provide $32 billion, whereas Paxlovid will contribute around $22 billion.
According to a press release from Comirnaty, the firm produced $13.2 billion in direct sales, which was fueled in part by global penetration of paediatric and booster dosages. On the other hand, Paxlovid made $1.5 billion in revenue during the quarter. In December 2021, the medicine was released in the United States.
Although there have been reports of waning demand for the tablet, Cantor Fitzgerald analysts stated in a letter to investors earlier this week that Paxlovid’s peak sales growth rate remained substantially under-appreciated. While many details were kept under wraps during Pfizer’s quarterly results call, the company did imply that the drug could benefit from certain near-term sales prospects across Europe and China. Furthermore, the drug will eventually be a commercial possibility in the United States.
Pfizer has bilateral deals that have been secured or are next to be secured in several countries, as per Angela Hwang, Pfizer’s group biopharmaceuticals president. At around the same time, the company is pursuing an EU-level deal, according to Hwang, who hinted that more information might be forthcoming soon.
Pfizer is also working with the local distributor, Meheco, in China to assure accessibility to the medicine, though it is unable to reveal financial terms or transaction volumes, as per Hwang. When it comes to transitioning Paxlovid to a regular commercial model in the United States, Pfizer’s chief scientific officer, Mikael Dolsten, M.D., Ph.D., stated that the firm aims to file its proposal for full clearance quite soon, most likely in the first part of the year.
Dolsten said that final approval will go a long way toward improving education and access in Paxlovid. Pfizer produced more than 6 million Paxlovid treatment courses by the end of March, all of which were shipped, according to CEO Albert Bourla, Ph.D. Since the international financial calendar quarter ends in February and the vast bulk of Pfizer’s Paxlovid courses are manufactured in March, only a tiny part of these consignments were mentioned in the first quarter sales, the CEO explained, adding that the company had dispatched approximately 8 million Paxlovid courses as of May 3rd.
Pfizer is on target to deliver 24 million courses in the second quarter, bringing the total for the first half of the year to 30 million, according to Bourla. The United States has stepped in with the intention of buying 20 million Paxlovid courses and also assisting in the production and distribution of the pills.
