NUMBER OF THE DAY
A Big Bet on a Low-Cost Covid-19 Vaccine, By the Numbers
The world’s largest vaccine maker and the Gates Foundation bet big on a Covid-19 vaccine that’s still being tested
$3 per dose: That’s the maximum price the Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest producer of vaccines, announced it will charge India and other low- and middle-income countries for a Covid-19 vaccine.
Backed by a $150 million interest-free, forgivable loan from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Serum Institute committed to produce in 2021 up to 100 million doses of the two Covid-19 vaccine candidates from Novavax, as well as from AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, both currently undergoing trials. That extra cash is helping to accelerate production and lower the price from the previously estimated $13 to just $3 per dose. (For comparison, the U.S. government set a $40 per dose benchmark in its deal with Pfizer and BioNTech, and $15 per dose in its latest deal with Moderna.)
The Serum Institute, founded and run by the Poonawallas, a wealthy Indian family, made a bold, early gamble on the Oxford vaccine candidate, entering into an agreement to mass-produce it back in April, when it was only just beginning human trials. The decision to…
