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A comment on Covid-19 Vaccinations in the United States. Parent comment

Re:Covid-19 Vaccinations in the United States by dehrmann on Tuesday December 29, 2020 @02:49AM (#25567680)
> If the Defence Production Act really ends up being used we could see the US hit herd immunity in 3 months.

We've had so much time to ramp up production that using the defense production act would just confuse things. We were actually producing vaccines before they were approved in order to rush this out.

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Re:Covid-19 Vaccinations in the United States by throwaway189262 on Tuesday December 29, 2020 @03:43AM (#25567928)
Vaccines are traditionally not very profitable. Companies don't have an incentive to ramp up production ASAP because they know as soon as everybody is vaccinated demand will tank. There's plenty more profitable things to spend their time and resources on.

However, for everyone besides the drug companies it's advantageous to manufacture doses as quickly as possible.

It's the same reason DPA is used in wars. It would be vastly more profitable to produce scarce luxury items but not in the best interest of society.

The interests of drug companies and society are not completely aligned here and DPA would force them to apply all their resources to the problem, rather than maximum profitability.

[ Parent | on HN ]