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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated
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To: LindyBill who wrote (78475)10/17/2004 7:32:19 PM
From: Alastair McIntosh  Read Replies (2) of 793798
 
Chiron thought that the flu vaccine business was profitable. It planned to double its production to over 50 million doses this year from 26 million in 2002. It paid $878 million for the British factory and was spending $100 million to upgrade it. It would hardly do this if it viewed the business as unprofitable.

Aventis Pasteur, now the major source of flu vaccine in the United States this year, noted that prices for flu vaccines have been rising steadily in recent years and are likely to be higher next year. In 1996, they sold for $1.80 a dose. The list price this year is $8.50. Considering a 500% price increase, economies of scale and the learning curve it would be hard to make a case that the vaccine is unprofitable.

The real problem was that the old plants of the vaccine manufacturers were having quality control problems and were having troubler complying with FDA regulations.

None of this has anything to do with government purchasing. I can't find anything on the web confirming central purchasing of flu vaccine except to stockpile a tiny 4.5 million doses (about 5%) of demand.

As far as buying drugs in large quantities from Canada, I doubt that the drug companies will go along with it. They are already cracking down on Canadian pharmacies selling to the U.S.
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