Pfizer has signed a deal with the Geneva-based UN agency Medicines Patent Pool, which will allow other manufacturers to make its experimental COVID-19 drug. The deal will open up access to treatment to at least 95 countries across the world. Under the terms of the agreement, Pfizer will not receive royalties on sales in low-income countries and will waive royalties on sales in all countries covered by the agreement while COVID-19 remains a public health emergency. The Pfizer drug is awaiting the US FDA authorisation at present. The company had earlier announced that the new drug reduces the risk of hospitalization and death by nearly 90 percent in people with mild to moderate SARS CoV-2 infection. Other drugmakers could start producing the pill within months, said Esteban Burrone, head of policy at the Medicines Patent Pool. But the deal has some caveats as well. It excludes some large countries from making the pill.