Moderna will not share its coronavirus vaccine formula with the world, but will instead increase production of the drug.
Moderna won’t be sharing its COVID-19 vaccine recipe because management decided that increasing internal production is the best approach to enhance global supply, the company’s chairman said Monday.
In the latest interview with The Associated Press, Noubar Afeyan restated Moderna’s promise not to seek anyone else developing a coronavirus vaccine during the epidemic.
“We didn’t have to do that,” Afeyan said.
”We think that was the right, responsible thing to do.” He added: “We want that to be helping the world.”
Moderna has being pressured by the UN to divulge their vaccination recipe. Afeyan said the company looked into sharing the messenger RNA technology and concluded it could increase manufacturing and provide billions more doses by 2022.
“Within the next six to nine months, the most reliable way to make high-quality vaccines and in an efficient way is going to be if we make them,” Afeyan said.
Asked about appeals from the World Health Organization and others, he contended that such pleas assumed ”that we couldn’t get enough capacity, but in fact we know we can.”
Moderna “went from having zero production to having 1 billion doses in less than a year,” Afeyan said, referring to the Massachusetts-based company’s sprint to develop the vaccine and produce it in large quantities. “And we think we will be able to go from 1 to 3 billion” in 2022.
“We think we are doing everything we can to help this pandemic,″ Afeyan added, citing the company’s increasing output and its pledge on patent infringement.
Moderna is working with multiple governments “to help them secure supplies for the express purpose of supplying to low-income countries,″ the executive said.
“There is more supply in the EU and the U.S. government than they will be able to use,” said Afeyan, who is also a co-founder of Moderna.
Separately, Moderna committed in May to Covax, the United Nations-backed vaccine initiative, to arrange for a total of 500 million doses to be distributed to poorer countries. He estimated that 40 million doses would be shipped in the last three months of this year, with the remainder shipping next year.
Moderna’s sole commercial product is the COVID-19 vaccine. Last week, the business announced plans to construct a vaccine facility somewhere in Africa. Afeyan expressed hope that a decision on a particular location will be reached soon. Still, it could take years to get the plant up and running.
Afeyan spoke on the final full day of a trip to Italy, where he visited Pope Francis, who has advocated for universal vaccine coverage. He also made an appearance in Venice to promote a humanitarian award.
Image Credit: Getty
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