Moderna will increase the price of its Covid shot fivefold to match that of its competitor Pfizer, can reveal.
CEO Stéphane Bancel said the cost of Moderna’s Covid vaccine will “rise a little” to be in the “same range” as Pfizer’s when it goes on the open market this year.
Americans can expect to pay around $130 for Moderna’s vaccine, which is estimated to cost just $1.18 to produce, a premium of 10,000 percent. The vaccine is currently sold for around $26 per dose.
Moderna – which posted an estimated $39 billion in profits last year – benefited from a multi-billion dollar taxpayer-funded support package to develop and test its Covid shot as part of the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed.
Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel announced his company would raise the price of its Covid shot five times to match competitor Pfizer’s offer of $110-$130 per vaccine
Mr Bancel told : “It is [the price] up a bit because the previous price was massively reduced…we got help from the US government.
“When we signed the first contract with the US, we made them an offer [with] a big discount.’
He added: “It’s now $26 in the US. That was the reduced price, it will go up. Pfizer said they will cost it between $110 and $130.
“We want to be the same ballpark.”
Pfizer was heavily criticized when it announced plans in October to raise the price of its shot to $130 later this year.
Moderna had previously considered raising the retail price to between $82 and $100 per dose.
Mr. Bancel appeared at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas on Saturday, where he met Jefferson Health President Dr. Stephen Klasko, spoke about Moderna’s joint venture with drug giant Merck to develop personalized cancer vaccines
Covid vaccines have been free for Americans regardless of insurance status during the pandemic.
This is thanks to Operation Warp Speed, which was enacted in the early weeks of the pandemic to speed up the development of Covid vaccines and treatments.
The Trump administration has spent more than $12 billion on biotech companies like Moderna, Janssen and Novavax to shorten the timeline for a viable vaccine.
Moderna, a Massachusetts-based biotech startup, has secured multiple deals with the federal government totaling more than $2.4 billion in the first year of the pandemic.
In July 2022, the US government awarded a $1.74 billion agreement to secure more than 65 million additional doses of Moderna’s Covid
Vaccine, bringing the total number of vaccines procured to over 560 million.
When those run out, negotiating the cost of vaccines will soon be left to insurance companies and private buyers – in the absence of the federal government buying up extra doses at a reasonable price.
The subsidized admissions were previously free for all Americans, regardless of whether they had health insurance. And while insured Americans aren’t likely to see any difference when they get the shots, those without coverage are hitting a hefty price tag.
Insurance premiums will cover the price increase, meaning Americans won’t actually be paying out of pocket, but it will still increase premiums everywhere.
A recent analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation of premium claims for 2023 showed that some insurers believe that the commercialization of vaccines will drive up premium costs across the board. And those costs could push premiums higher in the coming years.
Mr Bancel’s comments confirmed lawmakers’ fears that Pfizer’s price increase would prompt other Covid-shot makers to raise their price as well.
In a scathing letter to its CEO Albert Bourla last month, Democrat Sen Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Sen-elect Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont accused Pfizer of “unbecoming greed” and “pure and deadly greed” and called on it to change course .
Unlike Moderna, Pfizer and its partner company BioNTech did not accept federal funds to further research and development of a Covid vaccine. That’s not to say that Pfizer hasn’t received support from the US government, however.
Mr Bancel, whose net worth is $5.7 billion, told Moderna’s Covid shots will be in the “same ballpark” as rival vaccine maker Pfizer
Pfizer-BioNTech had signed a $2 billion agreement with the government early on to provide 100 million doses of its vaccine when it was approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
The Trump administration bought millions more cans in the months that followed.
It was forecast that Moderna would rake in between $18 billion and $19 billion from Covid vaccine deals in each of the past two years, a massive increase from 2020 when it raked in $803 million.
Meanwhile, competitor Pfizer was forecast to post sales of over $100 billion last year and $81.2 billion in 2021. These numbers give a clear indication of the $40 billion per year that the company has made in previous years.
The Biden administration’s Covid funding is drying up. Congress has resisted calls from the White House to increase federal funding for new vaccines, research and development, treatments and testing materials.
The federal government has spent a staggering $30 billion on Covid vaccines since the first became available in late December 2020, buying a total of 1.2 billion doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines combined.
This total includes the cost of developing and mass producing the bivalent vaccines targeting the original and omicron strains of Covid. However, these boosters were received with less than stellar enthusiasm.
Less than 14 percent of eligible Americans five years and older have received a bivalent booster shot, compared to 73 percent who completed the original two-shot regimen.
Health officials have struggled to rally support for the latest booster shot as the population grows increasingly weary of all things Covid.
The Biden administration redoubled its efforts to encourage apathetic Americans to get the boost, announcing a six-week blitz in November aimed at “reaching seniors and the communities hardest hit by Covid to make vaccination more convenient.” and to raise awareness through paid media.’
It comes after Pfizer forecast up to $15 billion in annual sales from its recordings by 2030.
Mr. Bancel made the comments at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas on Saturday, where he discussed Moderna’s joint venture with drug giant Merck to develop personalized cancer vaccines.