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Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) had previously announced that it was targeting the same range for COVID-19 vaccine doses.
Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said the company is now in discussions with hospitals, pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers over plans to provide COVID-19 vaccine boosters.
Both Pfizer and Moderna plan to offer new variant-matched vaccine boosters this fall.
Falling demand, increased prices
While demand for COVID-19 vaccines has steeply declined over the past year, Moderna and Pfizer have made billions of dollars from the products in recent years. The two companies have jointly sold 1.2 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines at a weighted average price of $20.69 per dose, according to KFF.
Initially, the U.S. government paid between $15 and $16 for COVID-19 vaccine doses from Moderna and Pfizer.
At the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, Pfizer CEO Dr. Albert Bourla noted that the company expected the pandemic to remain a “serious health issue” for “the next multiple years.”
Consequently, Pfizer plans to continue to make aggressive R&D investments in its COVID-19 franchise, which currently includes its COVID-19 vaccine, which it jointly developed with BioNTech (Nasdaq:BNTX) and the antiviral Paxlovid.
Moderna anticipates generating at least $5 billion in COVID-19 vaccine revenue in 2023.
A shift to endemic COVID-19?
CEO Stéphane Bancel has signaled its belief that the COVID-19 pandemic is currently transitioning to an endemic phase.
It thus plans to focus its fall booster campaign on people at high risk for severe COVID-19 infections.
Analysts have projected that Moderna’s 2023 revenues could total $5 billion, which would be about $13 billion less than 2022 levels. Bancel disagreed with that assessment, saying that the $5 billion figure relates only to contracts for COVID-19 vaccines in countries such as the UK and Canada. In other words, the figure “assumes no sales in the U.S.,” Bancel said.
Filed Under: Infectious Disease
