[ Moderna’s expected 400% hike for its COVID vaccine sparked
outrage on Capitol Hill.]
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400% PRICE HIKE OF COVID VACCINE  
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Ariel Zilber
January 12, 2023
NY Post
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_ Moderna’s expected 400% hike for its COVID vaccine sparked
outrage on Capitol Hill. _

Moderna is reportedly planning to more than quadruple the price of
its COVID vaccine., AFP via Getty Images

 

Moderna’s expected 400% hike for its COVID vaccine sparked outrage
on Capitol Hill.

The pharmaceutical giant
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could raise the price of the vaccine from its current $26 per dose to
between $110 and $130 per shot, according to The Wall Street Journal.
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Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) blasted Moderna, noting that the company
is getting rich off of a vaccine that was developed with financial aid
from taxpayers.

“This vaccine was discovered in partnership with the NIH, with a
government agency supported by the taxpayers of this country,”
Sanders told CNN on Wednesday.

“In addition, the government put $1.9 billion into research and
development for Moderna and then guaranteed Moderna billions of
dollars in sales.”

Last year, Moderna raked in $18.4 billion from sales of its COVID
vaccine.

“They’re going to charge whatever it is. 110 bucks a vaccine. It
costs about $2 to produce that vaccine,” Sanders countered.

“So, the taxpayers of this country who put money into the vaccine in
order to protect the health and lives of the American people are now
creating billionaires in an industry — in a company that it’s
going to quadruple prices for the American people,” the senator
added.

“That is outrageous, that is unacceptable, and we’ve got to do
something about that.”

Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel defended the anticipated price hike,
telling the Journal: “I would think this type of pricing is
consistent with the value.”

The move is similar to the one made by Moderna’s rival, Pfizer,
which raised the price of its COVID vaccine that was developed jointly
with BioNTech by some 400%.

Last month, Senators Elizabeth Warren (D.-Mass.) and Peter Welch
(D-Vt.) sent a letter to Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla calling the price
hike “pure and deadly greed.”

Pfizer, according to the senators, was guilty of “unseemly
profiteering.”

“We urge you to back off from your proposed price increases and
ensure COVID-19 vaccines are reasonably priced and accessible to
people across the United States,” they wrote.

Both the Moderna and the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, which use mRNA
technology, has been made available to Americans for free after the
doses were purchased by the federal government.

Both companies plan to shift to commercial distribution of the
vaccines once their contracts with the federal government expires.

In July, the government reached a deal with Moderna to pay $26 per
dose of the updated COVID booster shot. Previously, the government
paid between $15 and $16 per dose.

This past summer, the government agreed to pay Pfizer a little more
than $30 per dose — up from $19.50 per dose in 2020 contracts.

“We enter 2023 in a great position, with significant momentum across
our clinical pipeline, a highly energized team and a strong balance
sheet of over $18 billion of cash and cash equivalents,” Bancel said
in a press release Monday.

Moderna said it anticipated making a minimum of $5 billion in vaccine
sales this year.

* COVID-19
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* vaccines
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* Bernie Sanders
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