Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine: With a simple change in the product information sheet, € 3,120 million more per year in profit?

It is possible that I have the wrong information, because if not, it's difficult to understand it.

 

The Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine, Comirnaty, is supplied in 2.25 ml vials, from which the doses are drawn. When the North American drug agency, the FDA, approved this product, the technical characteristics presented by the company specified that 5 doses of vaccine could be extracted from each vial. The same number of doses per vial was specified in the authorization of the European agency, the EMA.

 

Pfizer / BioNTEch signed contracts with different countries and with the European Union, at a price per dose. Apparently € 12 per dose in the contract with the EU. As each vial had 5 doses, the price per vial was € 60.

 

As the vaccine began to be administered, the nurses and pharmacists found that if they used 1ml syringes they could extract up to 6 doses, since the dead space of each syringe wasted less product. This finding was very positive, since, with the same number of vials, more vaccinations could be achieved. (Keep in mind that this is not always the case, it depends on the availability of 1ml syringes and the skill of the professionals. In many cases, only 5 doses can be obtained).

 

The Pfizer company, according to press information, mobilized its managers to take steps at the FDA and the EMA, with one objective: that the product information sheet would say that the vial contains 6 doses, instead of 5 (1). Some officials of these agencies would be reluctant, but finally, the persuasion of the company achieved that on January 6 at the FDA and on January 8 at the EMA the technical data sheet was changed (2).

 

The intention of the company could be beneficial: with the same production effort it managed to get more people vaccinated. This would imply that the price per vial of 2.25 ml would be maintained at € 60, since the cost of production was the same, thus indirectly reducing the price per dose. However, it seems that the company wants to maintain the price per dose, with which, with the simple change of the technical data sheet, the price per vial becomes € 72, 20% more.

 

If Pfizer / BioNtech expected to invoice 260 million vials x € 60 in 2021, that is, € 15,600 million per year, with this simple change of product information sheet, they will invoice 260 million vials x € 72, that is, € 18,720 million: € 3,120 million more per year, without additional product. It would seem logical that the governments of the EU countries are happy that the vials can provide 6 doses, because they will speed up vaccination. But it would also seem logical that they would require the company to maintain the price per vial, since nothing has changed in terms of the effort to produce these vials.

 

The news that we know does not go in this direction. Apparently, the company wants to raise the price of 20% per vial, although they do not change anything. And, in addition, they are going to reduce the number of vials sent to each country each week, to adjust to the number of doses that, supposedly, can be extracted. In other words, vaccination would not be accelerated either.

 

How to qualify this operation, in times of pandemic and suffering of so many?

 

In another post, I explained that the price of € 12 per dose was 1,765 times higher than the cost of production, including manufacturing and research (€ 0.68). The logic of the company in view of a new business opportunity is impeccable: take advantage of it. What is inexplicable is that governments allow it.

 

It is time to demand that vaccines and treatments against COVID have a cost price. Public investment in research and aid in the development and manufacture of these products has been massive. In a pandemic situation, monopolies that raise prices on a whim and limit the volume of production, delaying access for millions of people, are inadmissible. EU Member States’ governments should support the initiative of India and South Africa in the World Trade Organization (to suspend the application of IP rights for COVID technologies), and promote the WHO' C-TAP initiative.

 

(1)

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/22/health/pfizer-vaccine.html

(2)

https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/news/extra-dose-vials-comirnaty-covid-19-vaccine