With Merck’s COVID Antiviral Announcement, Can the Pharma Pipeline Build Treatment Momentum?

 

At the start of the month, pharmaceutical company Merck dropped big news: It has developed a COVID antiviral drug that would cut hospitalization and mortality risks by 50%. In the drug’s study, patients taking the placebo pill saw 14% hospitalization rate and eight deaths, while the trial group with Merck’s drug had only 7% hospitalized and zero deaths.

This appears to be just the tip of the iceberg; Kaiser Health News reports at least three COVID antiviral candidates, including Merck’s, going through late-stage clinical trials, meaning a variety of COVID drugs could be on patient’s prescriptions here soon. What’ll be some of the positive domino effects to come from approval of COVID antivirals, not only on the pharmaceutical production pipeline, but on the general population’s health? Ira Leiderman, managing director of the healthcare practice at Cassel Salpeter & Co., gave MarketScale his take on the coming treatments.

Follow us on social media for the latest updates in B2B!

Image

Latest

Oncology
From Denial to Access: Rethinking Oncology Care Through AI, Clinical Trials, and Patient-Centered Innovation
April 1, 2026

The rapid expansion of precision medicine, biologics, and targeted cancer therapies is transforming oncology—but it’s also overwhelming a system not built to keep pace. In the U.S., cancer drugs now account for some of the highest-cost treatments in healthcare, and with that has come a surge in prior authorization requirements and denials. Studies suggest physicians…

Read More
Firefly
Pursuing the Impossible: The New Space Race with Firefly Aerospace Co-Founder Eric Salwan
April 1, 2026

Many companies set out to do something hard. Firefly Aerospace set out to do the impossible. After 10 years and several existential moments, Firefly did what no private company ever had: in 2025, it successfully landed on the Moon. Before Firefly, only countries had ever landed on the Moon—and it took extraordinary national effort…

Read More
internship
Tale of Two Interns: What AI Is Really Doing to Entry-Level Work
March 30, 2026

The narrative around early-career work has become increasingly pessimistic, with headlines pointing to a shrinking pool of entry-level roles, fewer internship opportunities, and AI accelerating both trends. But beneath that narrative, a different tension is emerging—one that’s less about the disappearance of opportunity and more about how it’s being reshaped. Students are using AI…

Read More
AI data center
Power, Cooling, and Risk: What It Takes to Bring a 100MW AI Data Center Online
March 28, 2026

The industry knows how to build data centers. What it’s still figuring out is how to turn on AI factories at scale. With facilities now crossing 100 megawatts—far beyond the 5 to 10 megawatt norm of traditional builds—operators are no longer just validating equipment. They’re testing whether entire systems—power, cooling, controls, and the teams behind…

Read More