Find a better way
There has to be a better way to protect us from infectious threats like Covid-19. Since the virus appeared in January, pharmaceutical companies and researchers have mobilised in a race to develop vaccines. US President Donald Trump has tipped billions into Project Warp Speed to get Big Pharma moving on vaccine development and building new factories to manufacture billions of vaccine doses.
The reality is that much of the investment will come to nothing. More than 90 per cent of vaccine candidates are never commercialised. A vaccine costs up to a billion dollars to develop because it is difficult to come up with one that is effective, safe and can be reliably manufactured.
Only about 5 per cent of the pharmaceutical industry’s revenue comes from vaccines. The lucrative stuff is the heart medications and cancer treatments that keep us in the developed world healthy for longer.
Big Pharma develops drugs and treatments, patents them for 20 years and reaps the rewards. They have no real incentive to work on difficult diseases that mainly hit people in poor countries who can’t pay for them. We’ve known about the existential threat of coronaviruses for years, but the Sars and Mers outbreaks weren’t enough to spur the world into action.
We need to tackle the problem in a more sustainable way. But how? Scientists name check two previously obscure organisations, GAVI and CEPI, that have now risen to prominence.
GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, is like the Red Cross of vaccines. It has helped vaccinate 760 million in its 20-year existence, saving 19 million lives in the process. Its focus is poor countries. CEPI is the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations. It has only been around since 2016 and its job is to take a more strategic, long-term approach to developing vaccines and treatments, to try to avoid the type of crisis we are currently in.
Integral to both organisations is the world’s powerhouse philanthropist couple, Bill and Melinda Gates, whose money has plugged a big gap left by self-interested Big Pharma and complacent governments.
We should get behind GAVI and CEPI and ramp up what they do. The world’s governments have come to the same conclusion, recently pledging US$8.8 billion in additional funding to GAVI. With a more sustainable approach, we have a better shot at staving off the next virus.
Big Pharma have no real incentive to work on difficult diseases that mainly hit people in poor countries