BioNTech-Pfizer initially wanted €54 per vaccine dose, claims German media

Three German media outlets released information over the weekend claiming that the European Commission received a confidential bid last summer from BioNTech and Pfizer, offering 500 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine for €27 billion, leading to suspicions of profiteering from the pandemic.

According to German public media broadcasters WDR and NDR, and the daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, the pharmaceutical companies said they would provide enough jabs to inoculate nearly half the EU's population for a price of €54.08 per dose - almost 20 times more than the cost of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

The BioNTech-Pfizer bid, which was made last June, already included "the highest percentage discount" offered to any developed country, the two companies said at the time.

The high costs have been criticised by the chairman of the Drug Commission of the German Medical Association, Wolf Dieter Ludwig.

"I think the price is dubious," he said, adding: "I see in it a profit motive that is in no way justified in the current pandemic situation." 

The EU eventually reached an agreement with Pfizer-BioNTech in November, though the final price was not disclosed.

Read more: EU set to buy 300m doses of Pfizer Covid vaccine

However, in late December Reuters published a report based on a leaked internal EU document that claimed the final negotiated price was set at €15.50 per jab for a total of 300 million doses.

The high prices the pharmaceutical companies wanted from the EU are not the only information that has raised eyebrows across the bloc.

The reports also say that Pfizer and BioNTech initially claimed that the vaccine's development had been "completely financed" by the companies themselves. 

While in Pfizer's case this may be true, but it is not so for German company BioNTech, which has been the beneficiary of millions in state subsidies.

The media groups were informed by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) that it had "provided significant support for the founding phase of BioNTech and provided financial and also structural support for the crucial first years of the spin-off."

A BioNTech spokesperson also said the company "received about €50 million in funding from the cluster initiative and EU programs during the first years after its founding."

The urgent nature of the vaccine's development means that the usual metrics cannot be applied to assess its benefits in the way that they would be usually. 

Read more: Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine approved for EU rollout

"The pharmaceutical industry always says that the high costs are due to research and development, but also because the benefits are so great," said Ludwig. 

"We are currently in a crisis situation, where the goal must be to vaccinate not only in the industrialised countries but worldwide. Against that background, I think the interests of the shareholders are less important than the interests of the populations that want to be free from this pandemic."

The companies have yet to respond directly to the news reports, though they did say the reported price was "within a certain range for all higher-income countries," and that no profit had been made so far.

BioNTech CEO Uğur Şahin has said that if a profit is made the company will  "reinvest in the further development of this technology."

A European Commission spokesperson said that contractual reasons prevented the releasing of details regarding pricing.

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