On Dec. 22, 2021, Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics announced that the United Kingdom Government agreed to purchase an additional 1.75 million patient courses of molnupiravir (MK-4482), an investigational oral antiviral COVID-19 medicine.

In the U.K., LAGEVRIOﾮ is the planned trademark for molnupiravir; the trademark for molnupiravir in other countries had not been approved. With this additional procurement agreement, which followed a previously announced agreement for 480,000 courses of treatment, the U.K. Government was committed to purchase a total of 2.23 million courses of molnupiravir.