Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel is testifying tomorrow before the United States Senate at a committee hearing chaired by Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Bancel will have to answer questions about Moderna’s profiteering from the COVID-19 vaccine.
A few salient facts:
- Development of the vaccine sold by Moderna was funded largely by American taxpayers — to the tune of some $2.1 billion.
- (At least some of a $1 million donation from music legend Dolly Parton to a university research center also went toward development of the vaccine marketed by Moderna.)
- And, as revealed by Public Citizen researchers, Moderna relied on inventions from government scientists — which of course were also paid for by our tax dollars.
- On top of that, the federal government bought millions and millions of vaccine doses from Moderna for $26.36 per dose — even though it costs the company less than $3 per dose to manufacture. (And, again, research and development was paid for by the American people, not the company.)
- As a result of all of this public support, Moderna made more than $19 billion in profits — that’s outright profits, after expenses — over just the past two years.
- And the company’s CEO has become a multi-billionaire. In fact, COVID-19 has made Stéphane Bancel the 565th richest person on a planet inhabited by over 8,000,000,000 human beings.
Yet despite all the public support Moderna has received and all the money it has already made, earlier this year the company brazenly announced its intention to more than quadruple the price of the COVID-19 vaccine it sells.
Following pressure from groups like Public Citizen, the company made a modest gesture in the direction of vaccine affordability for people without insurance.
We say that’s not good enough. Not nearly good enough.
For the benefit of all humankind, Moderna should sell its COVID-19 vaccine at cost or even make it free from this point forward.
Join Public Citizen in sending a direct message to Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel:
Dr. Jonas Salk refused to patent the polio vaccine — a choice estimated to have cost him billions. You have already become unimaginably wealthy as a result of the COVID-19 vaccine marketed by your company. And as you know full well, the development of that vaccine was funded largely by the American people. How much more money could you possibly need? We call on you to use the opportunity of testifying before Congress to commit Moderna to making its COVID-19 vaccine free to the world’s people from this point forward (or, at most, selling it at cost). Let that be your legacy, Mr. Bancel, not more billions in your bank account.
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For progress,
- Robert Weissman, President of Public Citizen
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