Recurring Revenue for COVID Vaccine Makers as the Need for Boosters is Approaching Reality
Posted on 07/25/2021
Israel’s Health Ministry now says Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech’s COVID-19 gene therapy shot is just 39% effective in Israel where the delta (Indian) variant is the dominant strain. However, the two-jab shot process does offer strong protection against severe illness and hospitalization, according to a new report from Israel’s Health Ministry. The shots are showing an 88% effectiveness against hospitalization and 91% effectiveness against severe illness, according to the Israeli data published in July 2021. Vaccine effectiveness can wain as coronaviruses can mutate.
The Francis Crick Institute is a biomedical research center in London, which was established in 2010 and opened in 2016. The institute is a partnership between Cancer Research UK, Imperial College London, King’s College London, the Medical Research Council, University College London, and the Wellcome Trust.
David LV Bauer, PhD, the senior study author and group leader of the Francis Crick Institute’s RNA Virus Replication Laboratory, said in a recent video interview, regarding the Pfizer COVID shots, “key message from our finding is that we found that recipients of the Pfizer vaccine, those who’ve had two doses, have about five to six fold lower amounts of neutralizing antibodies. Now these are the sort of gold standard private security antibodies of your immune system which block the virus from getting into your cells in the first place and so we found that that’s less for people with two doses. We’ve also found that for people with only one dose of the Pfizer jab that they are less likely to have high levels of these antibodies in their blood. And perhaps most importantly for all of us going forward is that we see that the older you are, the lower your levels are likely to be, and the time since you’ve had your second jab as that time goes on the lower your levels are also likely to be so that’s telling us that we’re probably going to be needing to prioritize boosters for older and more vulnerable people coming up soon especially if this new variant spreads.”
In June 2021, Bauer was quoted saying in a Francis Crick Institute press release, “New variants occur naturally, and those that have an advantage will spread. We now have the ability to quickly adapt our vaccination strategies to maximize protection where we know people are most vulnerable.”
He adds, “Keeping track of the evolutionary changes is essential for us to retain control over the pandemic and return to normality.”
Pfizer
BNT162b2 (Pfizer–BioNTech) is a COVID-19 vaccine containing nucleoside-modified messenger RNA. Global revenues for the 3-months ended April 2021 for the COVID drugs were at US$ 3.462 billion. This is more than any other drug Pfizer has produced for that time period. The next drug that did well was Eliquis which generated US$ 1.643 billion for the same time period. For Pfizer, the cost of sales increased as the the impact of BNT162b2, which includes a charge for the 50% gross margin split with BioNTech and royalty expenses. The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine is based on BioNTech proprietary mRNA technology, was developed by both BioNTech and Pfizer.
On July 23, 2021, Pfizer and BioNTech announced that the U.S. government has purchased an additional 200 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine. These doses are expected to be delivered from October 2021 through April 2022. This brings the total number of doses to be supplied by the companies to the U.S. government under its existing supply agreement to 500 million. In a separate announcement on June 10, 2021, Pfizer and BioNTech shared plans to provide the U.S. government with 500 million doses of the companies’ COVID-19 vaccine for donation to the world’s poorest nations. Eligible U.S. residents will continue to receive the vaccine for free, consistent with the U.S. government’s commitment for free access to COVID-19 vaccines.
According to the company’s recent press release, “The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine has not been approved or licensed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but has been authorized for emergency use by FDA under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) to prevent Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) for use in individuals 12 years of age and older. The emergency use of this product is only authorized for the duration of the declaration that circumstances exist justifying the authorization of emergency use of the medical product under Section 564 (b) (1) of the FD&C Act unless the declaration is terminated or authorization revoked sooner. Please see Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers Administering Vaccine (Vaccination Providers) and Full EUA Prescribing Information available at www.cvdvaccine-us.com.”
