Moderna's rumored $50-plus price on COVID-19 vaccine draws ire as company touts

The average consumer desperate to return to some sort of normalcy may not be thinking about how much an effective COVID-19 vaccine is going to cost, but investors in Moderna and other front-runners in this race—and their critics—most definitely are. Now, Moderna is in the spotlight, thanks to fresh rumors about its pricing plans.

Moderna is talking to governments about pricing its COVID-19 vaccine between $50 and $60 per course in the U.S. and other high-income countries, the Financial Times reported, citing anonymous sources. If the report proves true, that would put the cost of Moderna’s vaccine, mRNA-1273, at $25 to $30 per shot, well above the price of the vaccine being developed by Pfizer and BioNTech. They struck a deal with the U.S. government for a dose price of $19.50 last week.

A spokesperson for Moderna declined to comment on the company’s pricing plans, citing in an email to Fierce Pharma the confidentiality of “discussions with a number of governments and governmental entities about potential supply of mRNA-1273.”

Moderna may not have confirmed the price of mRNA-1273, but that didn’t stop one federal lawmaker from lashing out at the company, which has so far received $955 million in government funding to develop the vaccine.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Democrat, told Barron’s that if the report is true “it will represent yet another example of why we must require reasonable pricing of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments that have been developed by taxpayers.” Schakowsky blasted Moderna for “already contemplating how to turn [its] federal funding into sky-high profits.”

The many companies racing to develop COVID-19 vaccines have pursued different strategies for striking the right balance between alleviating a dire public health need and making a profit. Johnson & Johnson told Fierce Pharma it was taking a “not-for-profit” approach to developing its vaccine, and a company executive said during a federal hearing a week ago that it would set just one price for it, rather than adjusting the price based on each country’s ability to pay.

AstraZeneca has also made a no-profit pledge, while Novavax has said that if it makes a return on COVID-19 vaccination it would “an appropriate” one. Novavax told Fierce Pharma that its pricing strategy would be “thoughtful” and aimed at providing "equitable access throughout the globe."