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Future market for Covid vaccines "could be worth more than $10bn a year"

08 November 2020 11:19 (UTC +04:00)

The future market for Covid-19 vaccines could be worth more than $10bn (£7.6bn) in annual revenues for pharmaceutical companies, according to industry experts, even though some drugmakers have pledged to provide their vaccines on a not-for-profit basis during this pandemic, APA reports citing Guardian.

The calculations by analysts at Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse assume people will need to be vaccinated every year, similar to the traditional flu jab, with an average price of $20 for a Covid-19 vaccine dose. Prices range from $3 a dose to $37.

Matthew Harrison, an analyst at Morgan Stanley, estimates that even if only those who receive an annual flu jab take a Covid-19 shot, this would generate $10bn a year in revenues for the pharmaceutical industry in the US, Europe and other developed countries. He put the cost of producing a vaccine at $5-$10 a dose. The size of the market depends on whether people need to take the vaccine every year, or less frequently, as well as vaccination rates, and could be worth up to $25bn a year globally, he said.

Evan Seigerman, an analyst at Credit Suisse, said the US market alone could be worth $10bn, based on Pfizer’s vaccine pricing of $19.50 a dose, and assuming that 330 million citizens receive two doses each.

Mene Pangalos, executive vice-president at AstraZeneca, said the company hoped the coronavirus vaccine it was developing with the University of Oxford would “be effective for at least a year, maybe longer”.