GAVI Alliance calls for price reductions for vaccines

The GAVI Alliance and its chairman, Dagfinn Hoybraten, are calling for greater reductions in the price of vaccines in developing countries. A recent Reuters report examined the Advance Market Commitment, the means GAVI uses to fund its pneumococcal vaccines and the budget shortfall that the group faces, according to News-Medical.net. The AMC has persuaded two large producers, GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer, to offer pneumococcal vaccines developed for rich countries at a deep discount to poor ones. Under the terms of the AMC, GSK and Pfizer committed to providing Synflorix and Prevenar for an initial price of $7 per dose, followed by a maximum of $3.50 per dose. AMC advocates point out that the rapid distribution of vaccines to those that needed them could probably save 700,000 lives by 2015 by reducing rates of pneumonia, News-Medical.net reports. Not everyone is happy, however. Medicins Sans Frontieres criticized the AMC for simply providing two major companies with a...