MOSCOW, July 16. /TASS/. Russia will supply the Avifavir anti-coronavirus drug to Peru via a local company, not through the country’s Ministry of Health or the National Center for Supply of Strategic Health Resources (Cenares), a representative with the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) told TASS on Wednesday.

"It is a Peruvian company Euro Dental Medical Import SAC, that acts as a counterparty in supplies of Avifavir to Peru, not the Ministry of Health or the National Center for Supply of Strategic Health Resources," the representative explained.

The official also noted that RDIF had received one more purchase request for the antiviral drug from the Peruvian armed forces. He added that RDIF and ChemRar Group (co-founder of the joint venture producing Avifavir -TASS) are ready to fully meet the demand for the drug.

Earlier this week, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev stated in his column for the Newsweek magazine that over 50 countries, including Peru, had submitted requests to procure the Russian-made Avifavir anti-coronavirus drug.

But the Peruvian newspaper El Comercio denied this information. The newspaper cited Cenares saying that the center was not going to make any purchases of the antiviral drug from Russia. Cenares said that it only took part in a video conference dedicated to the launch of the product.

Avifavir is produced by a joint venture of RDIF and ChemRar Group. It is one of the two registered COVID-19 drugs in the world. Avifavir has also become the first Favipiravir-based drug in the world approved for treatment of COVID-19. It has shown high efficacy in clinical trials, disrupting the reproduction mechanisms of coronavirus.

On May 29, Avifavir received a registration certificate from Russia’s Ministry of Health and became the first Russian drug approved for treatment of COVID-19 patients. On June 3, the Ministry of Health included Avifavir in the seventh edition of the guidelines for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of the novel coronavirus infection.

To date, the number of people infected with the new coronavirus in Peru exceeds 330,000, more than 12,000 people have died.