The Future is Equal

Archives for May 21, 2021

India’s Serum Institute: COVAX “closed” until Christmas

Late yesterday the Indian vaccine manufacturer, Serum Institute, issued a statement indicating that no further supplies of vaccine for COVAX (the facility to help developing countries access COVID vaccines) will be available until the end of the year.

Meanwhile, New Zealand has enough doses to vaccinate the population at least six times over. Oxfam New Zealand’s Jo Spratt says that there is a moral obligation for New Zealand to share some of the supply for countries like India who have been hit the hardest.

“As COVAX has been supplying vaccines to the world’s poorest countries, it is devastating to think that now these countries will have to wait even longer. This disheartening development really helps illustrate how important it is for Aotearoa to step up and share more of our vaccine stockpile.”

Responding to the announcement, Oxfam’s Health Policy Manager, Anna Marriott, said:

“While the vaccination of people in India should be a priority, given the horrific toll COVID is having there, it is a huge concern that COVAX won’t be receiving any more doses until Christmas, given that Serum Institute is producing the majority of its doses.

“For months, rich country leaders have said they’re doing their bit to ensure developing countries receive vaccines by pointing to COVAX, but now their supply has effectively been turned off for the rest of the year. This comes at a time when many developing countries are facing soaring infection and death rates.

“The current approach that relies on a few pharma monopolies and a trickle of charity through COVAX is failing and people are dying as a result. It is time for those who are currently opposing a suspension of intellectual property rules, like the UK and Germany, to follow President Biden’s leadership to get more vaccines to developing countries.

“As G20 leaders prepare to meet at the Global Health Summit later this week they should consider how history will judge them for leaving the decisions of who lives and who dies from COVID-19 in the hands of just a handful of hugely profitable and powerful pharmaceutical corporations.”

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For more information and interviews:

David Bull
+64 27417 9724

COVID vaccines create 9 new billionaires with combined wealth greater than cost of vaccinating world’s poorest countries

At least nine people have become new billionaires since the beginning of the COVID pandemic, thanks to the excessive profits pharmaceutical corporations with monopolies on COVID vaccines are making, The People’s Vaccine Alliance revealed today ahead of a G20 leaders Global Health Summit.

Key members of the G20, who meet tomorrow, including the UK and Germany, are blocking moves to boost supply by ending companies’ monopoly control of vaccine production as COVID-19 continues to devastate lives in countries like India and Nepal where only a tiny fraction of the population has been vaccinated.

Between them, the nine new billionaires, have a combined net wealth of $19.3 billion, enough to fully vaccinate all people in low-income countries 1.3 times. Meanwhile, these countries have received only 0.2 per cent of the global supply of vaccines, because of the massive shortfall in available doses, despite being home to 10 per cent of the world’s population.

In addition, eight existing billionaires– who have extensive portfolios in the COVID-19 vaccine pharma corporations – have seen their combined wealth increase by $32.2 billion, enough to fully vaccinate everyone in India.

Campaigners from the People’s Vaccine Alliance – whose members include Global Justice Now, Oxfam and UNAIDS, have analysed Forbes Rich List data to highlight the massive wealth being generated for a handful of people from vaccines which were largely public funded.

Anna Marriott, Oxfam’s Health Policy Manager, said: “What a testament to our collective failure to control this cruel disease that we quickly create new vaccine billionaires but totally fail to vaccinate the billions who desperately need to feel safe.

“These billionaires are the human face of the huge profits many pharmaceutical corporations are making from the monopoly they hold on these vaccines. These vaccines were funded by public money and should be first and foremost a global public good, not a private profit opportunity. We need to urgently end these monopolies so that we can scale up vaccine production, drive down prices and vaccinate the world.”

Vaccine billionaires are being created as stocks in pharmaceutical firms rise rapidly in expectation of huge profits from the COVID-19 vaccines over which these firms have monopoly control. The alliance warned that these monopolies allow pharmaceutical corporations total control over the supply and price of vaccines, pushing up their profits while making it harder for poor countries, in particular, to secure the stocks they need.  

Earlier this month the US backed proposals by South Africa and India at the World Trade Organisation to temporarily break up these monopolies and lift the patents on COVID-19 vaccines. This move has the support of over 100 developing countries, and in recent days countries like Spain have also declared their support, as has the Pope and over 100 world leaders and Nobel laureates.

Despite this, other rich nations, including the UK and Germany, are still blocking the proposal, putting the interest of pharmaceutical companies over what’s best for the world. Italy, who are hosting the G20 Global Health Summit tomorrow, are continuing to sit on the fence on the issue, as are Canada and France.

Heidi Chow, Senior Policy and Campaigns Manager at Global Justice Now, said: “As thousands of people die each day in India, it is utterly repugnant that the UK, Germany and others want to put the interests of the billionaire owners of Big Pharma ahead of the desperate needs of millions.

“The highly effective vaccines we have are thanks to massive amounts of taxpayers’ money so it can’t be fair that private individuals are cashing in while hundreds of millions face second and third waves completely unprotected. It is a sad indictment of the loyalties of some current governments that a handful of people working for pharmaceutical companies have been allowed to become billionaires off the back of publicly-funded efforts to end the pandemic.”

Topping the list of new billionaires who have cashed in on the success of COVID vaccines are the CEOs of Moderna and BioNTech, each with a wealth over $4 billion or more. The list also includes two of Moderna’s founding investors and the company’s chair as well as the CEO of a company with a deal to manufacture and package the Moderna vaccine. This is despite the fact the vast majority of funding for the Moderna vaccine was paid for by taxpayers.The final three new vaccine billionaires are all co-founders of the Chinese vaccine company CanSino Biologics.

Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS, said: “While the companies making massive profits from COVID vaccines are refusing to share their science and technology with others in order to increase the global vaccine supply, the world continues to face the very real risk of mutations that could render the vaccines we have ineffective and put everyone at risk all over again.

“The pandemic has come at a terrible human cost, so it is obscene that profits continue to come before saving lives.”

/Ends

For more information or interview opportunities please contact: 

David Bull | Oxfam New Zealand | 0274 179 724 

Notes to Editors:

The People’s Vaccine Alliance is a movement of health, humanitarian and human rights organisations, past and present world leaders, health experts, faith leaders and economists advocating that COVID-19 vaccines are manufactured rapidly and at scale, as global common goods, free of intellectual property protections and made available to all people, in all countries, free of charge.  https://peoplesvaccine.org/

Data comes from an analysis of the annual Forbes Rich List, as published on 6 April 2021. : https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/

Figures for vaccinating all poorest countries is based on countries defined as ‘Low Income’, for which the population is 775,710,612 (according to UN Population 2020). The average vaccine cost, $19, is based on the  average mid-range cost per course of vaccination of the 5 leading vaccine producers. However, the prices should be far lower and the $19 is for illustration purposes and is in no way an endorsement of these unacceptably high prices. The wealth of the new billionaires could vaccine all Low-Income countries 1.3 times. The population of India (according to UN Population 2020) is 1.38 billion and the increase in wealth of the 8 existing billionaires could vaccine everyone in India 1.2 times. All figures based on a two-dose regimen. Vaccine doses in low income countries data from Our World in Data: https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths

The 9 new vaccine billionaires, in order of their net worth are:

  1. Stéphane Bancel –  Moderna’s CEO (worth $4.3 billion)
  2. Ugur Sahin, CEO and co-founder of BioNTech (worth $4 billion)
  3. Timothy Springer  – an immunologist and founding investor of Moderna (worth $2.2bn)
  4. Noubar Afeyan – Moderna’s Chairman (worth $1.9 billion)
  5. Juan Lopez-Belmonte– Chairman of ROVI, a company with a deal to manufacture and package the Moderna vaccine (worth $1.8 billion)
  6. Robert Langer – a scientist and founding investor in Moderna (worth $1.6 billion)
  7. Zhu Tao co-founder and chief scientific officer at CanSino Biologics (worth $1.3 billion)
  8. Qiu Dongxu, co-founder and senior vice president at CanSino Biologics (worth $1.2)
  9. Mao Huihua, also co-founder and senior vice president at CanSino Biologics (worth $1 billion)

The 8 vaccine billionaires who saw their wealth increase are: 

Name

Role/description

 

$ billions 2021

$ billions 2020

Jiang Rensheng & family

Chair, Zhifei Biological products

$24.40 

$7.60 

Cyrus Poonawalla

Founder, Serum Institute of India

$12.70

$8.20

Tse Ping

Sinopharm

$8.90

$7.30

Wu Guanjiang

Co-founder, Zhifei Biological products

$5.10

$1.80

Thomas Struengmann & family

Portfolio includes Germany’s BioNTech and Uruguay’s Mega Pharma

$11.00

$9.60

Andreas Struengmann & family

Portfolio includes Germany’s BioNTech and Uruguay’s Mega Pharma

$11.00

$9.60

Pankaj Patel

Controls listed company Cadila Healthcare. The company now manufactures drugs to treat Covid-19 such as Remdesivir from Gilead. Its Covid-19 vaccine, ZyCoV-D, is undergoing clinical trials.

$5.00

$2.90

Patrick Soon-Shiong

ImmunityBio – selected for the US federal government’s “Operation Warp Speed” to help quickly develop a Covid-19 vaccine.

$7.50

$6.40