Thread by @MaxCRoser

This study estimates the cost to produce the missing vaccines to protect *the entire world* from COVID.
mdpi.com/2076-393X/9/1/…

Facilities to produce 16 billion doses of a Moderna type vaccines would only cost around $4 billion, ~$2 a jab.

Easily the best deal of the decade.

If this is even remotely true it is unbelievably exciting news. 10- or 100-times that price would be cheap.

This important article outlines a plan for how to pull it off (it's based on the paper above).
nytimes.com/2021/01/12/opi…

Here is a perspective on the $4 billion price tag.

For the total cost of the entire production operation of this vaccine this is the relevant table – and the Moderna type vaccine is the one on the left.

CapEx = total capital investment cost
OpEx = annual operating cost

The operating costs of it depend very much on the amount of RNA per vaccine dose according to the study.

It varies from millions to billions per year.

– The NYT authors are interested in 16 billion doses; 2 for everyone in the world.

– The original study is interested in the cost of producing 8 billion vaccines – because they estimating that this is equal to missing vaccine doses. We also have other vaccines.

For this reason the NYT proposal – by the Pepvar authors – is putting a price of $4 billion on building the capacity.
That's the capacity needed for the entire world (as I said in the first tweet).

If the estimate of 8 billion missing vaccines is correct then it is even cheaper!

Another key question is how long this will all take, here is the authors view on that.

And the same is true is for the total costs, it depends on the vaccine.

The numbers quoted above – $4 billion for the production capacity and $2 for the vaccine (=$36 billion) – are the highest estimates in the paper and would mean enough doses for the entire world.

If we go with 8 billion doses (2 doses for 4 billion -- as the rest get other available vacciness) it drops to half, $18 billion for capacity and production costs.

And if it is possible to use one of the other 4 vaccines it would get cheaper.

This is just one paper.
All these estimates are very uncertain.
I have no background on this.

But it seems like one of the most important questions right now how to produce enough vaccines for everyone who wants to be protected from COVID.

It would be great if someone would explain this study well and bring together what experts think about the costs and feasability of increasing mRNA vaccine production fast.

Here is another thread on this same study:

https://twitter.com/PrEP4AllNow/status/1349406942171721728