COVID vaccine price update

According to a Kaiser Family Foundation analysis, the US government spent about $30 billion to accelerate and de-risk vaccine development. The main Pfizer and Moderna vaccines already got a price increase of over 50% from the initial pricing. Now, both Pfizer and Moderna are going to jack the price up by an additional ~400% to about $100-$120 per dose. 

The increase is not due to inflation or supply chain problems. It is due to greed and a complete lack of any require or logical connection between cost and benefit in America's unregulated, for-profit capitalist health care system. KFF writes:
The federal government has spent more than $30 billion1 on COVID-19 vaccines, including the new bivalent boosters, incentivizing their development, guaranteeing a market, and ensuring that these vaccines would be provided free of charge to the U.S. population. However, the Biden Administration has announced that it no longer has funding, absent further Congressional action, to make further purchases and has begun to prepare for the transition of COVID-19 vaccines to the commercial market. This means that manufacturers will be negotiating prices directly with insurers and purchasers, not just the federal government, and prices are expected to rise.

The federal government has so far purchased 1.2 billion doses of Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines combined, at a cost of $25.3 billion, or a weighted average purchase price of $20.69 per dose. In mid-2020, months before any COVID-19 vaccine was yet authorized or had even completed clinical trials, the federal government purchased an initial 200 million vaccine doses from Pfizer and Moderna (100 million each), at a price of $19.50 per dose and $15.25 per dose, respectively.


Once again, unregulated capitalist markets get to run free, wild and butt naked in their pursuit of greed-driven profit above all other considerations. Maybe that explains this:






By Germaine: The cost-benefit analysis advocate


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

That Uplifting Tweet You Just Shared? A Russian Troll Sent It

Image
Here’s what Russia’s 2020 disinformation operations look like, according to two experts on social media and propaganda. By   DARREN LINVILL   &   PATRICK WARREN Internet trolls don’t troll. Not the professionals at least. Professional trolls don’t go on social media to antagonize liberals or belittle conservatives. They are not narrow minded, drunk or angry. They don’t lack basic English language skills. They certainly aren’t  “somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds,”  as the president once put it. Your stereotypical trolls do exist on social media, but the amateurs aren’t a threat to Western democracy. Professional trolls, on the other hand, are the tip of the spear in the new digital, ideological battleground. To combat the threat they pose, we must first understand them — and take them seriously. MORE: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/russia-troll-2020-election-interference-twitter-916482/ Posted by Jamie B.
Read more

The Nightmare Scenario That Keeps Election Lawyers Up At Night -- And Could Hand Trump A Second Term

Image
The Nightmare Scenario That Keeps Election Lawyers Up At Night -- And Could Hand Trump A Second Term   (Photo: Photos: Getty Images) Americans will almost certainly go to bed on Nov. 3 without knowing who won the presidential election. Since millions of people will vote by mail, constraints on time and resources will slow ballot counting into potentially a weeks-long process. Voting patterns suggest it’s likely that President  Donald Trump  could end Election Day in the lead in certain key states, only to be overtaken by Democratic opponent  Joe Biden  when more votes are tallied.  This could create a nightmare scenario during the three months stretching from Election Day to the Jan. 20 inauguration: a battle on the state and congressional level over who is the legitimate winner. This could include Congress reconvening on Jan. 6, presided over by Vice President  Mike Pence , with no consensus over its potential role in choosing the next president. This is arguably the most likely of th
Read more

Philosophical Question #14 – Lifestyle Choices

Image
Here is an interesting question in my list of philosophical questions: 1.) Should governments have penalties for those who live unhealthy lifestyles? A list of unhealthy lifestyles would include things like smoking, drinking, illegal drugs, prostitution, and other “vice” type activities. I guess the “government penalties” would be referring to monetary punishments, withholding medical treatments (insurance companies would love that), possibly imposing/regulating very high (exorbitant) prices on things considered unhealthy in order to cut down on their use, and other possibilities. 2.) Or, would you say that living an unhealthy lifestyle, likely resulting in a LOT of eventual personal pain and suffering, should be punishment enough for unhealthy lifestyles? When people make bad choices in life, often in their youth where ignorance and immediate gratification takes them over,  3.) Should a society be obligated to help "fix" them, by way of tax money?   Is that part of
Read more