Covid Test Kits, Vaccine & Treatment Pricing to Rise

Until now, the federal government has been purchasing COVID-19 shots. It recently bought 105 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech bivalent booster for about $30.48 a dose, and 66 million doses of Moderna’s version for $26.36 a dose.

Pfizer and Moderna were already planning their moves into the commercial market. Both have indicated that as soon as that happens, they will raise the price they charge, somewhere in the range of $110 to $130 per dose, though insurers and government health programs could negotiate lower rates.

“We see a double-digit billion[-dollar] market opportunity,” investors were told at a JPMorgan conference in San Francisco recently by Ryan Richardson, chief strategy officer for BioNTech.

As for COVID treatments, an August blog post by the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response noted that government-purchased supplies of the drug Paxlovid are expected to last at least through midyear before the private sector takes over. The government’s bulk purchase price from manufacturer Pfizer was $530 for a course of treatment, and it isn’t yet known what the companies will charge once government supplies run out.

Sheesh I know the answer to that. Whatever the market will bear.

Of course. That’s how markets work.

DB2