The Swiss Medical Products Agency (Medical Products Agency) has granted its first approval for an antimalarial drug for infants, marking a major breakthrough in the fight against a disease that claims hundreds of thousands of lives each year, mostly in Africa.
The agency announced it had given the green light to a drug developed by the Swiss company Novartis, based in Basel, for the treatment of children weighing between 2 and 5 kilograms. This approval is expected to pave the way for affected African countries to adopt the drug in the coming months.
The company said the decision is significant in part because it marks only the third time the agency has approved a treatment under the accelerator program, coordinated with the World Health Organization, to facilitate access to essential medicines for developing countries.
The new drug is a combination of two antimalarial drugs and is a lower-dose version of a tablet previously approved for other age groups, including older children.
A company spokesperson said that eight African countries participated in evaluating the drug and are expected to approve it within 90 days, adding that the company plans to launch the drug "on a largely non-profit basis" in countries where malaria is endemic.
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