[News] COVID-19: Big Pharma’s ‘Obscene’ Profits

[Anti-Imperialist News]

orinocotribune.com 
<https://orinocotribune.com/covid-19-big-pharmas-obscene-profits/>


  COVID-19: Big Pharma’s ‘Obscene’ Profits

By Jake Johnson – Nov 18, 2021

*Moderna, Pfizer and BioNTech rake in millions an hour while refusing to 
share manufacturing recipes with low-income countries.*

Moderna, Pfizer and BioNTech — the makers of the two most successful 
coronavirus vaccines — are raking in a combined $65,000 in profits every 
minute as they refuse to share their manufacturing recipes with 
developing countries 
<https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/10/22/science/developing-country-covid-vaccines.html>, 
where billions of people still lack access to lifesaving shots.

According to a new People’s Vaccine Alliance analysis 
<https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/pfizer-biontech-and-moderna-making-1000-profit-every-second-while-worlds-poorest> of 
recent earnings reports, People’s Vaccine Alliance,  “It is obscene that 
just a few companies are making millions of dollars in profit every 
single hour while just two percent of people in low-income countries 
have been fully vaccinated against coronavirus,” said Maaza Seyoum of 
the People’s Vaccine Alliance Africa.

“Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna have used their monopolies to prioritize 
the most profitable contracts with the richest governments, leaving 
low-income countries out in the cold.”

RELATED CONTENT: Pfizer Prioritizes Profits over People, Refuses to 
Release COVID-19 Vaccine Patent 
<https://orinocotribune.com/pfizer-prioritizes-profits-over-people-refuses-to-release-covid-19-vaccine-patent/>

Moderna — a Massachusetts-based company that developed its vaccine with 
the help of government research 
<https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/11/11/nih-praised-finally-showing-modicum-verve-vaccine-patent-fight-moderna> and 
around $10 billion in taxpayer funding — has delivered just 0.2 percent 
of its total vaccine supply to low-income countries, the People’s 
Vaccine Alliance estimates. The coronavirus vaccine is Moderna’s only 
product on the market.

Pfizer and its Germany-based partner BioNTech — whose vaccine was also 
helped along 
<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-09/pfizer-vaccine-s-funding-came-from-berlin-not-washington> by 
taxpayer money — haven’t done much better than their competitor, sending 
less than 1 percent of their supply to poor nations while profiting 
hugely from sales to rich countries.

“Predominantly, right now, we have already signed orders, and those are 
with high-income countries,” Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla recently said 
<https://www.barrons.com/articles/pfizer-covid-earnings-ceo-51635884114> of 
coronavirus vaccine sales for next year, blaming poor countries for not 
ordering shots quickly enough.

“We are negotiating right now with few middle-income countries, and with 
even fewer low-income countries,” Bourla said.

But public health campaigners argue that bilateral deals and vaccine 
donations are not sufficient to bring production and distribution into 
line with global needs. Instead, they say, pharmaceutical giants must 
relinquish their vaccine recipes and allow qualified manufacturers 
<https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/10/22/science/developing-country-covid-vaccines.html> around 
the world to produce low-cost generic versions for their populations.

RELATED CONTENT: Bad Intentions: US Sanctions Iranian Pharmaceutical 
Company Developing Anti-COVID Vaccine 
<https://orinocotribune.com/bad-intentions-us-sanctions-iranian-pharmaceutical-company-developing-anti-covid-vaccine/>

Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech have thus far refused to do so — and lobbied 
aggressively 
<https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2021-pfizer-secret-to-whats-in-the-covid-vaccine/> against 
a World Trade Organization proposal to temporarily suspend vaccine 
patents. Bourla, for his part, has dismissed technology-transfer 
proposals as “dangerous nonsense.”

“Contrary to what Pfizer’s CEO says, the real nonsense is claiming the 
experience and expertise to develop and manufacture lifesaving medicines 
and vaccines does not exist in developing countries,” Anna Marriott, 
health policy manager at Oxfam International, said 
<https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/pfizer-biontech-and-moderna-making-1000-profit-every-second-while-worlds-poorest> in 
a statement Tuesday. “This is just a false excuse that pharmaceutical 
companies are hiding behind to protect their astronomical profits.”

“It is also a complete failure of government to allow these companies to 
maintain monopoly control and artificially constrain supply in the midst 
of a pandemic while so many people in the world are yet to be 
vaccinated,” she added.

(Consortium News 
<https://consortiumnews.com/2021/11/18/covid-19-big-pharmas-obscene-profits/>)

Jake Johnson is a staff writer for Common Dreams.
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