The big corporations in the pharmaceutical industry expect gigantic profits by the vaccine business
By Michael Pröbsting, International Secretary of the Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT), 12 February 2021, www.thecommunists.net
N-TV, a major television news channel in Germany, has published a highly interesting report. The article explains: “Initially, the development of the corona vaccines was a one-off feat financed by government aid worth billions. But now it is becoming increasingly clear that a permanent market is emerging for the pharmaceutical companies, which could be far more profitable than the current global vaccination campaign.”
The author, referring to estimations of analysts, reports: “A market is emerging that, according to analyst estimates, could turn over up to $ 23 billion – year after year. Of this money, much more is likely to be left over as profit for the pharmaceutical companies. In a conference call with investors, Pfizer announced according to "Bloomberg" that it would increase the price. The scope is therefore enormous: Pfizer currently charges 19.50 dollars per corona vaccination dose in the USA, for example. For other vaccines, the company takes up to $ 175.” [1]
N-TV is beyond any suspicion of sharing “anti-capitalist prejudices” or “Corona conspiracy theories”. The channel is a kind of German version of CNN. It is owned by Bertelsmann, one of the world's largest media corporations. This makes the article even more valuable as it represents a report from arch-capitalist media about gigantic profit expectations for their brothers- and sisters-in-crime in the pharmaceutical industry.
To give you an idea. A market of $23 billion is the equivalent of the total annual economic output of a whole nation state like Cyprus – a member of the European Union!
Only a fool can overlook that the capitalists of the pharmaceutical corporations have a huge incentive for creating public hysteria about the Corona Virus and its mutation. Only someone who willingly closes eyes and ears can ignore the fact that these corporations are pushing governments all over the world to spend gigantic sums on public vaccination programs. Only an idiot can brush aside the fact that these corporations and the capitalist governments – which are both closely linked via career opportunities, huge provisions, secret deals, etc. – are pushing such vaccination programs irrespective if they are safe and irrespective if they are effective. They will say to themselves: “Who cares, if we can make 23 billion bucks?!”
True, ministers of all capitalist government around the world, medical “experts” a la Drosten and Ferguson (today’s version of Rasputin), media commentators – they will all denounce such critical observations as “crazy conspiracy theory”. “Trust in science”, they will say. And the loyal servants of the capitalism among the left – the Lockdown Left – will continue to act as useful idiots and servilely repeat their phrases.
The RCIT has pointed out since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis that the ruling class has deliberately created public fear in order to exploit the pandemic for their political and economic interests. On one hand, they are massively expanding the police and surveillance state – a process which we call a shift from parliamentary democracy to Chauvinist State Bonapartism. On the other hand, the big corporations utilize the crisis for advancing the process of monopolization and for creating gigantic profits. [2]
In the past weeks we have published several articles which demonstrate, based on official reports, that the monopoly capitalists made gigantic profits in the past 12 months. [3] For them, the Lockdown policy is highly advantageous! It is only the Lockdown Left which refuses to recognize this elementary fact. [4] Worse, many of them even call now for a longer and more draconic curfew for the popular masses (see e.g. the notorious bourgeois “ZeroCovid” campaign). [5] Who can deny it any longer: The Lockdown Left are the bosses’ best friends forever!
Let us conclude by stating once more that all pharmaceutical corporations should be expropriated and nationalized under control of the working people. This is the way to make sure that only such vaccine is produced which is seriously tested and which serves public health and not the profit of a few. It is also the precondition for international cooperation between all institutions – instead of reckless dog eat dog rivalry. Only such global planning and coordination will result in enhancing the health and living conditions of the world population (and not only of those in rich countries). Furthermore, socialists must continue to fight against the Lockdown policy and restrictions of democratic rights! No police and surveillance state!
[1] Max Borowski: Jährlich neue Impfkampagnen Corona-Mutanten schaffen Milliarden-Markt, 9 February 2021, https://www.n-tv.de/wirtschaft/Corona-Mutanten-schaffen-Milliarden-Markt-article22347267.html?utm_source=pocket-newtab-global-de-DE; an English version of the article can be read here: New vaccination campaigns every year: Corona mutants create a billion-dollar market, https://gettotext.com/new-vaccination-campaigns-every-year-corona-mutants-create-a-billion-dollar-market/
[2] The RCIT has analyzed the COVID-19 counterrevolution extensively since its beginning. Starting from 2 February 2020 we have published nearly 80 pamphlets, essays, articles and statements plus a book which are all compiled at a special sub-page on our website: https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/collection-of-articles-on-the-2019-corona-virus/. In particular we refer readers to the RCIT Manifesto: COVID-19: A Cover for a Major Global Counterrevolutionary Offensive. We are at a turning point in the world situation as the ruling classes provoke a war-like atmosphere in order to legitimize the build-up of chauvinist state-bonapartist regimes, 21 March 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-a-cover-for-a-major-global-counterrevolutionary-offensive/. In addition, we draw attention to our book by Michael Pröbsting: The COVID-19 Global Counterrevolution: What It Is and How to Fight It. A Marxist analysis and strategy for the revolutionary struggle, RCIT Books, April 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/the-covid-19-global-counterrevolution/. See also our very first article on this issue by Almedina Gunić: Coronavirus: "I am not a Virus"... but WE will be the Cure! The chauvinist campaign behind the “Wuhan Coronavirus” hysteria and the revolutionary answer, 2 February 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/wuhan-virus/; Michael Pröbsting: The Second Wave of the COVID-19 Counterrevolution. On the ruling class strategy in the current conjuncture, its inner contradictions and the perspectives of the workers and popular resistance, 20 July 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/the-second-wave-of-the-covid-19-counterrevolution/; by the same author: The Police and Surveillance State in the Post-Lockdown Phase. A global review of the ruling class’s plans of expanding the bonapartist state machinery amidst the COVID-19 crisis, 21 May 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/police-and-surveillance-state-in-post-lockdown-phase/; COVID-19: The Great Barrington Declaration is indeed Great! Numerous medical scientists protest against the reactionary lockdown policy, 11 October 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-the-great-barrington-declaration-is-indeed-great/; Michael Pröbsting: COVID-19: The Current and Historical Roots of Bourgeois Lockdown “Socialism”. Police State and Universal Basic Income are key elements of the new version of reformist “War Socialism” of 1914, 19 December 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/covid-19-the-current-and-historical-roots-of-bourgeois-lockdown-socialism/.
[3] See e.g. Michael Pröbsting: COVID-19: That Was A Damn Good Year … for the Billionaires in West and East who massively gained from the anti-democratic Lockdown policy, 5 January 2021, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-that-was-a-damn-good-year-for-the-billionaires-in-west-and-east/
[4] For our critique of the Lockdown Left see e.g. chapter V of our above-mentioned book by Michael Pröbsting: The COVID-19 Global Counterrevolution: What It Is and How to Fight It; see also by the same author the last chapters in the above mentioned essay: The Second Wave of the COVID-19 Counterrevolution; COVID-19 and the Lockdown Left: The Example of PODEMOS and Stalinism in Spain, 24 March 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-lockdown-left-podemos-and-stalinism-in-spain/; Social-Bonapartism in Argentina. The Partido Obrero (Tendencia) of Jorge Altamira supports the State of Emergency, 29 April 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/latin-america/social-bonapartism-in-argentina/; When Ultra-Leftism marries Social-Bonapartism and Gives Birth to “Post-Marxist” Obscurantism. A reply to the CWG/ILTT, 5 May 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-when-ultra-leftism-marries-social-bonapartism/; Brazil: Social-Bonapartism of the Lockdown Left in Practice. How the leaderships of the trade unions, PT, PCdoB, the pseudo-Trotskyist PSTU and PSOL sabotage the struggle against the Bolsonaro government, 10 June 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/latin-america/brazil-social-bonapartism-of-the-lockdown-left-in-practice/; Lockdown Left says: “Cops Need to Enforce Laws”. The ex-revolutionary L5I as another example for shameful social-bonapartism in the era of the COVID-19 counterrevolution, 24 July 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/lockdown-left-l5i-says-cops-need-to-enforce-laws/; COVID-19: Zero Socialism in the “ZeroCOVID“ campaign. Following the model of China and Australia, some British Stalinists and “Trotskyists” call for a “total and indefinite lockdown”, 22 December 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-zero-socialism-in-the-zerocovid-campaign/; COVID-19: The Current and Historical Roots of Bourgeois Lockdown “Socialism”. Police State and Universal Basic Income are key elements of the new version of reformist “War Socialism” of 1914, 19 December 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/covid-19-the-current-and-historical-roots-of-bourgeois-lockdown-socialism/
[5] See on this e.g. Michael Pröbsting: COVID-19: Zero Socialism in the “ZeroCOVID“ campaign. Following the model of China and Australia, some British Stalinists and “Trotskyists” call for a “total and indefinite lockdown”, 22 December 2020, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/global/covid-19-zero-socialism-in-the-zerocovid-campaign/