(by Nicola Simonetti) GlaxoSmithKline (Gsk), an English multinational, has invested 30 million euros in the San Paolo di Torrile plants in Parma, building a modern 1.500 square meter plant destined for production for the production of a new anti-HIV drug (the virus responsible for AIDS), by ViiV Healthcare, (majority company GlaxoSmithKline, with participation of Pfizer Inc. and Shionogi Limited).
This drug innovates in aids therapy when it proves effective in patients to patients whose current therapy is ineffective making them "orphans of care".
It is, in fact, a new class of antiretroviral drugs that prevent the virus from "sticking" and penetrating into the human cell and reproducing it there (replication) and flooding the organism.
The plant, built in record time of just over a year, defies all caution so much is the "certainty" gained of its effectiveness and harmlessness since the clinical trial is still ongoing even if in an almost terminal phase. But the evidence provided so far leaves no doubt about it.
“The new plant - assures the director of the new plant Maria Chiara Amadei will start production immediately. The first batches will soon be ready to accompany the registration application in the USA and Europe in 2019/2020 ... Today we are giving an important signal of consolidation of our presence in this territory in the long term through strong innovation. Although here we produce innovative drugs all over the world with the use of cutting-edge technologies, creating an ad hoc structure to produce an anti-HIV drug was a challenge that we managed to win thanks to the commitment of our collaborators and technical skills of the territory "
With over 640 collaborators working in different areas, in the 2017, Parma has produced 110 millions of units, destined for 120 markets all over the world. With the other two production sites in Verona and Rosia (Siena) 215 millions of units are reached, and the export generated is around 550 millions of euro.
"With this investment - says Luis Arosemena, president and ad. of Gsk - we continue a tradition of research and industrial production that sees us engaged in Italy by 1904 and today with a research center, three plants that produce drugs and vaccines exported all over the world and over 4 thousand employees ".