The pandemic has sparked an undreamt-of demand for vaccines.
At Biontech, Pfizer and Moderna, that makes huge profits.
Davos - The pharmaceutical companies Biontech *, Pfizer and Moderna are making $ 1,000 (almost 880 euros) profit every second with their corona vaccines, according to research by a global vaccination alliance. The People's Vaccine Alliance (PVA) has calculated this on the basis of the company's annual reports and the expectations and profit margins stated there. Against this background, the alliance criticized on Tuesday that hardly anyone in Africa is still fully vaccinated and called for patent protection to be suspended.
The PVA, to which around 80 organizations such as Oxfam and UNAIDS belong, took on the quarterly and nine-month reports of the US corporations Pfizer and Moderna and the German company Biontech.
After analyzing the numbers of achieved and expected sales and profits, the alliance came up with a combined total annual profit for the companies before taxes of 34 billion dollars - with the Corona * vaccines alone.
Corona pandemic: two new billionaires
This profit corresponds to 93.5 million dollars per day or 1000 per second.
The companies had produced five new billionaires in the pandemic, who together currently have net worth of $ 35.1 billion, the alliance complained.
She also accused the companies of "first serving the financially strongest customers" and thus placing profit before world health - because in Africa 94 percent of the population are still not fully vaccinated.
Pfizer and Biontech and Moderna "have used their monopolies to give preference to the most profitable contracts with the richest governments," said Maaza Seyoum of the African Alliance and the People's Vaccine Alliance Africa.
"To do this, they leave an entire continent out in the rain."
Corona pandemic: Strong criticism due to long delivery times for African countries
Pfizer and Biontech, which together produce a vaccine, have sold 50 million doses to the African Union (AU), and Moderna sold 15 million doses.
The end of this year is the delivery date, "but the AU has not received a single dose from either of the two companies," said the alliance.
Meanwhile, in richer countries it is already about the booster vaccinations.
According to PVA, Moderna has so far only supplied 0.2 percent of its entire range of vaccines to low-income countries overall, while Biontech and Pfizer have 0.4 percent.
It is therefore necessary to suspend patent protection for Covid-19 vaccines as well as tests and treatments for the disease.
The vaccine technology and the necessary know-how must be "passed on to all capable manufacturers", demanded the alliance.
Corona pandemic: Experts advocate extended licensing
Basically, however, experts point out that it is questionable how quickly a company in countries like India or South Africa would be able to set up the technical prerequisites and the necessary infrastructure for vaccine production.
Another argument is that the production problems could also be solved through licenses that the companies issue.
With their profits from the vaccines, Biontech, Pfizer and Moderna are behaving differently from manufacturers Astrazeneca and Johnson & Johnson.
So far, these companies have been selling their vaccines at cost price - that is, without making a profit.
The British-Swedish pharmaceutical company Astrazeneca announced a "gradual" transition a few days ago and wants to make a profit with its vaccine in the future.
Among other things, the money is to flow into a corona drug that is currently being developed.
(AFP) Merkur.de is part of IPPEN.MEDIA.