Thread by @MMKavanagh

Calling on @USATODAY to withdraw/correct this piece. Says @SSWorks claim taxpayers paid 100% of Moderna vaccine is Partly False. But (w/respect) you misunderstood research funding, universities & drug discovery.
here's why🧵
@MMStewartNews @nicole_carroll
usatoday.com/story/news/fac…

....@USATODAY says it's false because "the vaccine was funded by a combination of government spending, private donations and research grants" and that "$2.5 billion was given for the development of the company's vaccine and to purchase doses" not for research. Nope 🙅.../2

...First, there's the matter of very clear public funding on the front end. 1) NIH scientists directly worked on this (yay them!) along with handing out grants to others to work on this 2) BARDA gave $955m.
✔️Both are taxpayer funding for research.../3

...then seems @USATODAY misunderstood inclusion of Emory & Vanderbilt as non-taxpayer funding. In fact, look @NEJM,
NIH NIAD funded work by:
✔️Emory
✔️Vanderbilt
✔️Emmes
NIH NCATS funded
✔️Vanderbilt
CEPI (mostly public $) kicked in for trial/4
nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…

...so what's left? Dolly Parton. Dolly gave $1m to Vanderbilt (😚!). But perspective, even w/o $ for doses that is 0.1% (not 1%, 0.1%). Private money can be flexible so I'm sure it helped. But is @USATODAY saying @SSWorks is false b/c should have said 99.9% funded by taxpayers?/5

...finally there's $2.5b. USG made an "Advanced Market Commitment"--a way to fund research on the back end by taking away rest of the risk for Moderna with promise of purchase even if their vaccine wasn't the best a long as it worked, which NIH funding had already shown likely/6

...so @USATODAY @MMStewartNews @nicole_carroll I'm happy to talk if you want? but you got this one wrong. This is publicly funded research, we can debate what that means for who "owns" it, but you should take this incorrect fact check down, issue correction & give credit /fin