China to provide 2 billion doses of vaccine to world this year

The contract stated who would own the vaccine patent. The USA PAID for that patent, spending hundreds of millions on its creation. The original contract said the US would own the patent, with the paid manufacturer having full rights to produce and distribute it.

The advantage of that is that the US could help other countries.

Trump demanded that the contract NOT allow the US to do that.

You can not blame that on Pfizer or the others.

 

I'm not placing blame. I don't know what's going on with all that.

Can you point me to info on Trump blocking that? I totally believe you. He's an @sshat like that. I would just like to learn more about it.

 

Looking into the negotiation of the original deal on patents would be a great idea, but so much has happened since then that it's hard to come up with a search that will show what happened at that time. I'd love to see any progress on finding this as it could pertain to the current issue.

Before his term ended, Trump moved to further protect the companies that owned the patents on these vaccines by making it harder for the US to help other countries.

https://theintercept.com/2021/04/02/covid-vaccine-price-hikes/

One of the points here was that Trump didn't want "reasonable terms" to have anything to do with pricing. The drug company would be able to ask any price it wanted, and that could not be used as a reason for going around the patent to aid other countries.

This came after the drug companies won the right to own the patent, of course.

The Biden administration has been active in moves to waive patent restrictions so that the US can more easily help other nations get COVID vaccines.
https://www.reuters.com/business/he...ys-plans-back-wto-waiver-vaccines-2021-05-05/

Republicans oppose this move:
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/551769-house-republicans-urge-opposition-to-vaccine-patent-waiver


As an indication of Trump's attitude toward other nations;
In 2020, Trump was informed by a German company that they were developing a successful vaccine.

Trump immediately attempted to buy the company to move it to the USA to make vaccines exclusively for the USA. Germany was impressed - in a certain way.

https://www.politico.eu/article/ger...d-to-buy-firm-working-on-coronavirus-vaccine/

 

OK. So, if I'm understanding this correctly Trump wanted controlling interests to be retained for the US ONLY? Why would ANY other country agree to something like that?

Of course, I can understand why our manufacturers would want to hold those patents also. It's financially lucrative.

I'm a little confused about the Republican resistance part.

Is it because they don't want to help "outsiders" or because they don't think the virus is "that bad" or they are mostly anti-vax or is it solely because there is a Democrat President in the seat at this time?

One of the arguments @CenterField made about us helping other countries with our vaccine overages is that it eventually helps us by helping to slow the spread of the virus and its variants. That just makes sense.

Thanks for your input on this. I'm going to poke around and see what I can find on it.

 

@WillReadmore, so...the first thought that crossed my mind is that I didn't recall ever hearing about Germany making a vaccine. It looks like Pfizer got their funding from Germany and NOT Operation Warp Speed.

Does this mean Germany owns those patents and/or are entitled to a certain percentage of the completed vaccines and/or some type of financial compensation?

In one of the articles I just read, it was said that German officials were really annoyed with Trump about this and stated that their vaccines would be available to the world, not just one country. If true, does that mean Pfizer CAN share the patent with poorer countries? I thought I understood this when I was under the impression we financed Operation Warp Speed and all the patents were owned by the US manufacturers. I don't really understand how the mix turns with Germany financing them on the front end.

Would this be the kind of thing that would have upset Trump since his idea was shot down by Germany? He has always seemed a bit overly-sensitive and learning this part makes me wonder why he was so adamant about NOT participating when the other former Presidents invited him to do the public service with them all getting vaccinated on camera. I could see how he would hold a grudge like that especially if they were to get the Pfizer vaccine.

You've given me a lot to research and think about. Thanks again.

 

The vaccine maker that Trump tried to purchase made the CureVac, a vaccine that failed. Efficacy 47%, below the threshold for approval. Withdrawn, cancelled. Thankfully for the US, he didn't succeed in purchasing the company, LOL.

Pfizer and BioNTech did not accept research and development money form Operation Warp Speed. They did agree to an offer of selling 100 million vaccines to the US for 2 billion dollars in case their vaccine succeeded and earned FDA approval (which did happen and they did sell it - that was them being a supplier, not being financed by OWS - Pfizer used their own money for R&D), and they did accept some distribution logistics from OWS after the vaccine was already made. None of this affects the patent. Pfizer and BioNTech continue to own the patent to their vaccine.

Pfizer didn't need funding from Germany. Pfizer is a mega-company with 500 billion dollars of operating budget and 50 billion dollars of annual profits.

Germany did fund BioNTech.

The pharmaceutical companies are obviously against sharing the patent with poorer countries. I think that withdrawing the patent rights from the companies would be a terrible mistake. What company in the future would want to invest in vaccines? Pharmaceutical companies are for-profit components of a capitalist system and if we were to sort of nationalize their patents, preventing them from recovering the huge amounts of money they invest in R&D, what we'd get would be a world without vaccines and without the modern medications that are the bulk of all medical care.

Leftists love to scream and yell against these companies until they get a bad infection, then they run to the doctor for an antibiotic. Their kids do not die of polio or measles thanks to the vaccines made by these companies.

All this hatred of pharmaceutical companies is misguided. Sure, some regulation is needed to prevent escalation of prices for the consumer and I favor more negotiation power for governments and hospital system conglomerates to buy the medications and the vaccines without price gouging by the makers, but without viable pharmaceutical companies we'd fall back to the middle ages and life expectancy would dramatically drop.

Pharmaceutical companies are part of the modern world, regardless of how leftists feel about them.

 

Centerfield, thanks for jumping in here. I've learned quite a bit today.

Oh, wow. That's not good.

This is more of a request for your opinion since I doubt you would *know* how that whole thing went down but does the President (in this case, Trump) have scientific advisers at their disposal? What I'm trying to figure out is did Trump just want to buy CureVac to obtain the vaccine exclusively for the US or would he have had the opportunity to have an expert consider their plans and potential for creating a product that would be approvable? How would he (Trump) know what to offer them without some kind of *expert* telling him the estimated value of anything they produce?

And both companies have shared vaccines but not released their patents? Is that correct?

OK. I got that from here: https://fortune.com/2020/11/09/pfizer-vaccine-funding-warp-speed-germany/

What does Germany get from the deal if BioNTech retains the patents?

And, that just makes good business sense and would across the board. Even non-for-profits have to have an income.

Well, you know you're not going to drag me into a partisan debate so...moving on...

I understand about the unreachability for certain medications due to exorbitant pricing but I'm unclear on what you are calling pharmaceutical hatred. Is there something else behind that that you know of?

ALL people want to save money.
ALL people want to be able to get their and their loved one's medications when they need them.

It's not just leftists.

 

Firstly, I don't know why you assign so much of this to leftist. The right wing thinks the pharmaceutical companies are putting tracking chips and magnets in vaccines.

And a big part of the problem with pharmaceutical companies is what we pay for drugs. For example, at one time about 10 years ago, I went a brief time without medical insurance due to my divorce. My toothpaste-sized tube of topical psoriasis medication (Clobetasol propionate) cost almost $1000. It came into medical use in 1978. That is criminal. But I didn't have any options.

Even with insurance my viagra cost almost $30 a pill. Talk about having a guy by the balls!

Many elderly people face the choice of paying for their meds, or paying for food.

 

Oh, do you think Trump believes that he needs expert advice? He is a stable genius, remember? He thinks he knows better than everybody else.
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Shared vaccines? The companies SOLD vaccines.
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What Germany got? Vaccines at a discount price, and the guarantee of a reserved chunk of the market.
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Your link: correct, like I said. Pfizer didn't get any funding. They spent about $2 billion of their own money. They partner BioNTech did get funding from the German government. I'm saying the same thing that your link is saying.
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Pharmaceutical hatred - maybe not specifically here, but berating what they call Big Pharma is a favorite theme of the left.

 

Yeah, antivaxxers are crazy too, but there are antivaxxers who are leftists, too.
Yes, I said, there needs to be regulations to prevent price gouging.
What you are saying, if you are American, is a local phenomenon, given that over here pharmaceutical companies are given pricing free reins thanks to their lobbies.
There are countries where the market is more regulated, but you know that when regulations tried to be passed, for example to allow Medicare to negotiate prices, the attempt was defeated in Congress.
Of course, as capitalist ventures, if you allow them free rein, they will push up the prices, because this is not exactly a market that is regulated by free market forces (given that like you said, patients don't have much of a choice to take their business elsewhere if prices are excessive).

 

Did you check where the multivitamin you buy cheaply on Amazon was made? Most chemical compounds these days are made in China, including the ones used in common drugs.

 

Bold - this is the exact system that we use in Australia, to great success. As you are probably aware, pharmaceutical companies here negotiate to have their products put on a PBS (pharmaceutical benefits scheme) list, which is basically a government subsidy for their product. They get to make decent profit however there's little wiggle room for price gouging.

 

Yes, I know it's been said he's a stable genius.

Did he offer to buy the company for exclusive rights for the US as POTUS or a private business owner?

1. As POTUS - Could he have made this decision unilaterally without expert advice? (let's say they were interested).

2. As a private business owner. - In theory, could he have made this purchase as a private business person WHILE seated POTUS? If so, I'm assuming the idea would be to then sell the vaccines to the USA for profit.

I believe there are many reasons why electing Trump was a bad idea but this makes me wonder if there will be new legislation put forth about electing private business owners because of the muddy conflict of interest. This is the same issue with him basically *forcing* the government to pay his price gouging rates for Secret Service to stay in his hotels during his golf outings and vacations. That's a bit too close for comfort, in my opinion.
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This is what I was getting at. So, the "sharing" part of the vaccines (in any direction) happened/happens at the government level and not directly from the manufacturer?
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Makes sense.
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I was not refuting your statement. I was sharing where I read about that.
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OK. As you know, words matter and I didn't want to leave that phrasing hanging for anyone else that comes across this thread.

 

@CenterField, I also intended to mention that HAD I been a Trump supporter anytime between 2016 and 2020, this specific act would have raised concerns. We've all heard about his many failed ventures and scams as a private business owner. The only reasons he is probably still solvent is he cheated his family out of their fair share of the inheritance from his dad, created scam charities and a scam school and constantly has his hand out of the "Big Lie" (he hasn't dropped one dime of his on seeing that through). It's amazing that anybody views him as a "success" story.

However, jumping in the deep end of the pool without knowing how to swim is reckless when spending *our* money.

 

They are knowingly killing people with their outrageous prices. In my book that is pretty evil.

 

Actually if we're talking "most", most are made in India, these days. India is nicknamed the pharmacy of the world.

 

Agreed. Capitalism does have an evil spin. However, I like to say that capitalism is the worst system, except for all the others.

 

I meant, HE thinks that he is a stable genius.
I believe he wanted the US government to purchase the company.
Yes, it would have been a disastrous move, given what we know now about the failure of the CureVac. Yes, it would have added to a long list of Trump's business failures, this time using our money.

I'm not very sure what you are getting at with this sharing stuff.

The companies so far have retained the patents. Governments buy from the companies and distribute the vaccines to their population, or donate them to poorer countries directly or through the WHO consortium called Covax Initiative.

There's been no direct sales of the vaccine from the makers to consumers or private businesses, yet.

If by sharing you mean, waving the patent rights so that any generic maker in any country can make the vaccines, yes, there is a movement in this sense but I find it disastrous, with dire down-the-road consequences. People can't relate to this with short-term solutions to this problem. Disrupt the patent system and you may simply see corporations leaving this market. Besides, it's not so easy to make these advanced vaccines and most Third World countries wouldn't be able to, anyway.

 

And oh what a luxury we have, to say 'no'. So many countries can't afford the vaccines and are relying on COVAX. I'm sure they would be thrilled to receive a shipment.

 

My apologies, Pants. I wasn't trying to be flippant. I think it's great that China is willing to help other countries that we couldn't or wouldn't.

I didn't mean anything besides my own inner grumblings about China's intentional or unintentional or complicity or culpability regarding the virus.

Will you accept my apology? I should have reworded my post to be more sensitive.

 

No apologies necessary! I wasn't specifically responding to your post - more of a commentary on all those saying 'no way'. First off, China isn't offering it to the US and second, other less fortunate countries would be chomping at the bit.

And I'm with you on the China grumblings.

 

I knew what you meant. I heard him say that. He also said that he gets his smarts because his uncle was an engineer and professor at MIT. The man-child is a lunatic. I thought that was already understood which is why I didn't comment further on that part of your post.

This is why I asked if there was some kind of "official" process for vetting these kind of proposals or if the POTUS can make them unilaterally (which we would have known firsthand if Germany was interested).

Several months ago you started a thread about why it is good to share our vaccine overages with poorer countries. Back then, I was under the impression that meant our GOVERNMENT would donate the overages to the chosen recipient(s).

I got stuck when I read about Germany's contribution to BioNTech. I was trying to connect the dots between their investment and if that would possibly entail a percentage of those vaccines being donated to their allies.

Now, I understand the inner connections. Thanks for elaborating.

No. I understand patent law.

I agree pushing our manufacturers out is NOT the way to ensure our longevity or solvency (a higher death rates means fewer US workers).

 

I don't know about the German company that claimed to Trump that they were close to having a vaccine for COVID - where they got their funds, whether they were finally successful etc.

As far as I know, Pfizer can do anything it wants with its patent. I think the real crime is that there are billions who haven't gotten it, mostly because it is too expensive or not enough is available. And, besides the humanitarian aspect, that means there is a giant opportunity for the virus to mutate to something worse, as in how we got the delta version.

The move Biden has supported is oriented to allowing government to get more people vaccinated while ignoring at least certain aspects of these patents that are slowing distribution.

Let's be careful, as I could easily have made mistakes in parts of this, especially in Trump's involvement. The level of political action one way and the other is probably expectable and hard to explore.

I like that the EU has been staunchly behind a world wide solution and distribution from the start, when they could have been just as interested in themselves.

 

China isn't taking on the USA with military might, as it knows that's a no-win situation. Instead its advancing to the top world power position through soft power, building, investing, etc. And its doing it well, and has little restraint in terms of social democracy or self destruction over social issues.

 

I really don't understand why most US citizens don't *get* this. It's blatant at this point.