For when the anticovid vaccine is already on sale

What will the new stage be like in which we are all already learning to live with the Covid-19 pandemic virus? No one knows for sure, but for now the certainty is that the virus is here to stay, and most likely so is the vaccine. The question is how we will apply it to the future.

Pharmaceutical directors are confident that there will be an application at least annually and that immunizations are already beginning to enter the market, but at the same time they know that it will be in much smaller volumes. It is estimated that the anticovid vaccine will be applied in quantities similar to that of influenza, which in the case of Mexico are between 30 and 40 million doses each year.

A few days ago, Moderna’s global medical director, Paul Burton, said in a press session with Latin American media that the approval by health regulators so that anticovid vaccines can be sold openly on the market is already close, that is to say that their authorization is no longer for emergency use but rather a general approval so that they can already be acquired by private companies and not only by governments as it has been until now.

He foresaw that at least the FDA, the United States health regulator, and the EMA, the European health regulator, will already be in that transition in 2023 so that in 2024 the open sale of pandemic vaccines will be allowed, just as it happens with any other existing vaccines.

If so, this will mean a radical change in the management of the pandemic or, rather, it is to be expected that there will no longer be a pandemic, but that we have already passed the endemic phase, whose scientific description is when there is a usual number or expected number of cases of a disease in a geographic area or in a specific population.

It would be expected that given the large profits obtained by the pharmaceutical companies that developed the anticovid vaccines, particularly Pfizer and Moderna with their versions based on messenger RNA, they no longer have so much pressure from the shareholders because they have already achieved the return on investment with the income achieved. for the massive sale of their immunizations. But it seems not. The Wall Street Journal published last Thursday that Pfizer estimates the commercial price of its anticovid vaccine between 110 and 130 dollars (the equivalent of 2,200 and 2,600 pesos), a price almost 4 times higher than the 30 dollars at which it was sold to the US government. . In the case of the Moderna vaccine, its price in the market could reach 100 dollars per dose (2,000 pesos), more than 5 times higher than the 16.50 dollars at which it was sold to governments. And they hope to place their bivalent version Spikevax that generates a more lasting immunity.

These excessive price increases seek to compensate for the lower demand for reinforcements. But it remains to be seen whether the market accepts them, and whether people agree to continue applying the reinforcements even paying for them out of pocket and at those prices. It is understood that the Government will have to continue buying a certain amount to cover segments of the vulnerable population, as is the case with the influenza vaccine.

For now, the price announcements have worked to bolster shares in Pfizer, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, which have dropped nearly 30% in the last year. In the case of Moderna, BioNTech and Novavax, three young pharmaceutical companies whose livelihoods depend above all on Covid immunizations to generate practically all of their profits, their shares have fallen by at least two-thirds in the last year.

Different potential of mRNA

At Moderna they are convinced that messenger RNA is extremely powerful and adaptable to the extent that their researchers are working on 15 different programs for new vaccines for different viruses. These include HIV, syncytial virus, herpes simplex and varicella zoster, cytomegalovirus, and the EBV virus that causes infectious mononucleosis. They also do research on rare diseases and oncology. In the latter they are allied with Merck to get options tailored to an individual by identifying antigens in tumors; this would be like an immunization against cancer which could contain up to 30 proteins in a single vaccine. We will know what results they obtain in the following years.

semar’s lab

The fact that the Secretary of the Navy now has its own Pharmacology and Toxicology Laboratory authorized by Cofepris is highly relevant news. With this, the unit will be able to analyze narcotics and other substances of illicit origin in customs and ports, that is, the Administrations of the National Port System (Asipona) sectorized to Semar. But also the idea is to encourage and promote medical research within the Army. One question that remains is: is the plan to support Mexico’s Central Customs Laboratory or to cast it aside?

CIEP analysis of the health budget

Highly recommended to read the analysis issued by the Center for Economic and Budgetary Research (CIEP), “Expenditure on health and Sustainable Development Goals.” It refers that for health Mexico has only allocated between 2.5% and 2.9% of its annual GDP, this is less than half of the 6% of GDP suggested internationally. During the pandemic in 2020, health spending increased by 3.4% compared to 2019 and was a tenth of what would have been required to respond to Covid-19. Although a historical increase of the order of 14.6% is proposed for next year, it still stands at 2.93% of GDP.

maribel.coronel@eleconomista.mx