US pharmaceutical giant Merck has vowed to avoid the pitfalls of the global Covid-19 vaccine rollout by ensuring its new anti-coronavirus pill is made available in wealthy and poor countries at almost the same time.

Paul Schaper, the company's executive director of global public policy, told AFP that Merck began working on its access strategy from July 2020, long before the efficacy results of the drug it developed with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics were announced in October 2021.

“We started developing our supply chain very early on,” he said, with the company projecting it will have 10 million courses ready by the end of this year and at least double that figure in 2022.

These, he said, would be priced according to a tiered framework that is based on a country's ability to pay, as defined by World Bank data.