India may soon get a latest breakthrough treatment for the deadly Hepatitis C virus. The American  manufacturer has provided licenses to 11 Indian firms following an approval from United States authorities.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the latest breakthrough treatment Gilead Sciences. The company has developed drug called Epclusa, which is developed to treat all genotypes of the Hepatitis C virus.

Nearly 150 million people afflict worldwide with the deadly Hepatitis C virus and approximately 12 million in India.

Ira Jacobson, MD, chairman of the Department of Medicine at Mount Sinai Beth Israel, New York and a principal investigator in the Epclusa clinical trials, said that, “The approval of Epclusa represents an important step forward in the global effort to control and potentially eliminate HCV as it provides a safe, simple and effective cure for the majority of HCV-infected patients, regardless of genotype.”

“Building on the established backbone of sofosbuvir, Epclusa demonstrated consistently high cure rates across all genotypes, including among patients with genotype 2 and 3, who traditionally have required ribavirin or other multi-pill regimens,” he said.

The Gilead Sciences  in cooperation with its 11 partners in India are pioneering a Voluntary Licensing model which transfers technology and Intellectual Property for latest treatments and cures for viral Hepatitis and HIV as well.

“This forward thinking strategy opened for these Indian companies the market across all of India for generic versions of these drugs, plus the market for 100 other countries,” an industry source said.

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Nandini