Amid a push to bolster antibiotic manufacturing in the U.S., a facility that closed last year due to bankruptcy has been reopened by new ownership, which hopes to jump-start production and meet nationwide demand for a widely prescribed treatment.
Jackson Healthcare expects the USAntibiotics plant in Bristol, Tenn., to produce 300 million capsules and 2 billion tablets of amoxicillin and its variants annually, and stockpile a five-year supply for the U.S. Amoxicillin, a member of the penicillin family, makes up about one-third of all antibiotics prescribed in the U.S. each year.
The move marks the first time in 43 years that the site, which is the only manufacturing facility in the U.S. that is authorized to produce amoxicillin, has been under American ownership. And it will ramp up production as the Covid-19 pandemic has focused attention on weaknesses in the U.S. supply chain for pharmaceuticals, such as antibiotics, as well as active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).
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