Biden administration to buy Pfizer antiviral pills for 10 million people, hoping to transform pandemic

As the administration and Pfizer on Tuesday hammered out the final details, the company asked federal regulators to authorize the five-day antiviral pill regimen called Paxlovid. The medication is the second easy-to-take treatment aimed at keeping newly infected people out of the hospital to go before the Food and Drug Administration. The other is by Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics.

Biden aides see both treatments as potential game-changers to help restore a sense of normalcy heading toward the pandemic’s second anniversary and are eager to add them to a still-small collection of treatments for Americans who contract the coronavirus, according to officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the deal. With breakthrough cases rising and 30 percent of adults not fully vaccinated, health officials say the pills will help tame the pandemic by thwarting the virus’s most pernicious effects.