Merck and Indonesia’s state-owned pharmaceutical holding company PT Bio Farma have entered a licensing agreement for the state-owned drug manufacturer to produce the MSD four-valent HPV vaccine locally. The pact is part of the country’s efforts to launch a national HPV immunization program in 2023, according to a translated Dec. 13 press release. Merck and Bio Farma have had a partnership since 2016.
According to the latest numbers from the HPV Information Centre, Indonesia has a population of around 99.8 million women aged 15 and older who are at risk of developing cervical cancer. Around 36,000 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer, and around 21,000 women die from the disease in the country each year.
Bio Farma aims to integrate Indonesia’s healthcare ecosystems to strengthen the country’s healthcare system and self-sufficiency. To this end, in 2022, it entered into a collaboration with British company Profactor Pharma. Under the terms of the collaboration, Bio Farma has obtained exclusive rights to develop recombinant factor VIII blood products jointly.
It plans to integrate the healthcare ecosystem into a super-app called Mediverse or Medical Universe. The application will connect online patients with online and offline clinics. It will also include clinic, laboratory, and hospital networks spread across Indonesia.
The company has guaranteed the security of user data for the digital application services it is developing in order to strengthen national health system resilience. and is working closely with Indonesia’s National Cyber and Crypto Agency (BSSN). Bio Farma is collaborating with several global technology and health companies, such as Google Cloud, Fitbit, and ConnectedLife, on the latest digital health innovations.
Currently, Bio Farma is intensively developing end-to-end services for the health sector, including pharmaceutical research and development, manufacturing, and distribution, as well as operating retail pharmacies, clinics, and clinical laboratories through a digital system called the Healthcare Ecosystem.
Bio Farma is also developing a website-based business-to-business (B2B) drug and medical devices marketplace called Medicine Distribution Business Zone (Medbiz). Medbiz will be connected to several medicine and health equipment distributor networks across Indonesia to enable its customers to find quality health products.
(Sources: Antara News; Endpoints News)
