Hi John,
A year ago today, 90 year-old Coventry resident Margaret Keenan became the first person in the world to receive a Covid-19 vaccine dose. Then, as now, we knew that a successful vaccine programme would be key to ending the pandemic. The news was met with hope.
There was also hope that the ingenious work of scientists and the vast levels of public funding would lead governments to pool resources and share knowledge to make sure the vaccine roll out was fast and efficient.
Those of us who have followed the history of multinational drug companies knew they would resist any notion of collaboration. But a year later, the disaster of their monopoly control over Covid vaccines – and governments’ failure to force change – still has the power to shock.
Last week we calculated that in the days following the emergence of the Omicron variant, Pfizer and Moderna’s top eight shareholders saw their wealth grow by $10bn.(1) There couldn’t be a clearer indication that these companies prioritise turning public investment into profit – not people’s health. Moderna’s CEO alone pocketed $3.19m in share sell-offs.
Tell Moderna’s CEO to share the vaccine recipe.
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If it’s a deeply worrying time for all of us, it appears to be a very promising one for drug companies. But with Pfizer’s vaccine now set to become the most lucrative drug of all time, and Moderna’s also making astronomical profits, it’s time to say enough is enough.
The model based on free trade and monopoly control simply isn’t working. It’s staggering that after an entire year, only 6% of people in low-income countries have received a single jab. To put this in perspective, the UK had already surpassed these numbers by mid-January and had given a first jab to half the country by the end of April.
With scientists warning that this deep vaccine inequity increases the likelihood of new variants, pharma companies must give up – or be forced to give up – their chokehold on vaccine production. As my colleague Nick said when interviewed yesterday(2), these companies are cashing in on a crisis for which they are increasingly responsible.
Factories around the world are ready to start production on vaccines, but intellectual property rules and pharma greed continue to get in the way.
A year on from the first vaccine delivered in the UK, many countries have not been allowed to get vaccine programmes off the ground. If this mutation, or a future one, is able to evade existing vaccines, many more of us could also be back to square one.
For all our sakes, vaccine apartheid must end here.
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Help ensure Covid-19 vaccines are available to everyone, everywhere
It’s vitally important that Covid-19 vaccine patents are suspended during the pandemic, and for big pharma to share their know-how globally, as the best way of ensuring there are enough vaccines for everyone everywhere.
Regular gifts give us the long-term stability to plan effective campaigns and the flexibility to respond to crises like these.
If you’re not already a member, will you join today?
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