0:01 [Music]
0:04 teams of scientists around the world
0:06 are racing to develop a vaccine to end
0:08 the covert 19 pandemic
0:10 hundreds of volunteers are set to trial
0:12 a new vaccine against coronavirus
0:14 in the global race for a coronavirus
0:17 vaccine russia said today
0:19 it's already won but the challenge of
0:21 finding a vaccine
0:23 is only the first step to inoculating
0:25 everyone in the world
0:28 whichever country or company pioneers a vaccine
0:29 vaccine
0:32 will be in a powerful position but there
0:34 will be huge ethical questions about how
0:37 it's deployed fairly [Music]
0:39 [Music]
0:41 you submitted your questions to slovaya chancova
0:42 chancova
0:45 our healthcare correspondent and callum williams
0:45 williams
0:48 our senior economics writer here are
0:50 their answers
0:52 will there ever be a silver bullet vaccine
0:54 vaccine [Music]
0:56 [Music]
0:58 the short answer is we don't know there
0:59 are several vaccines
1:01 in late stage clinical trials but we
1:03 don't yet know
1:05 which of those will work in different
1:07 populations some of them may work
1:09 better in elderly people some of them
1:12 may be better at preventing the disease
1:14 versus preventing people from infecting others
1:15 others
1:17 so it remains to be seen what kind of vaccine
1:18 vaccine
1:21 we will have and there is a chance that
1:23 we may not have one
1:25 as well so vaccines that are at this
1:27 stage of clinical trials
1:30 you usually have a chance of success at about
1:30 about
1:34 80 percent so that's fairly high however
1:37 some of the vaccines are using novel technologies
1:38 technologies
1:41 meaning that the risk could be higher
1:43 how long would it take for the whole
1:46 world to be vaccinated
1:48 it will probably take a couple of years
1:49 at least
1:51 even if we have a successful vaccine
1:54 available as soon as this year and
1:54 that's because
1:57 manufacturing capacity around the world
1:58 is limited
2:00 some experts believe that in the first year
2:01 year
2:05 or through the end of 2021 we may have
2:08 just about two billion doses of a covet
2:10 19 vaccine
2:12 that's nowhere near enough to cover the
2:13 entire world
2:15 and of course it might be the case that
2:17 some people require more than one
2:20 dose right in order to become uh immune
2:21 so it might be that
2:23 two billion can only cover you know a
2:25 billion people or perhaps even fewer
2:27 who benefits financially from the vaccine
2:29 vaccine
2:31 the short answer is that everybody
2:33 benefits from the introduction of a
2:34 successful vaccine
2:36 um it's you can measure this a number of
2:38 different ways but uh at the moment the
2:39 global economy is
2:42 losing in the region of 200 to 250 billion
2:43 billion
2:45 dollars a week from the uh from the
2:48 economic effects of the pandemic
2:49 and so that means that even having a
2:52 vaccine even a single day
2:54 uh ahead of where you could expect it to
2:56 be is actually a really really good news
2:57 and it has benefits in the billions of dollars
2:58 dollars
2:59 i think it's fair to say that there will
3:02 be some countries and some people
3:03 uh that benefit financially much more
3:05 than others some of the pharmaceutical
3:08 companies that have the vaccines in late
3:10 stage trials have already said that they will
3:11 will
3:13 sell them at costs so on a non-profit
3:15 basis at least for the first year
3:18 but this pandemic has been so expensive
3:19 for the world
3:22 that you can see um how a vaccine can be
3:24 a very very precious commodity
3:25 that's true i mean i guess i would add
3:27 to that if it was gonna
3:29 uh incentivize people to develop the
3:32 vaccine faster or distribute it faster
3:34 i would see no reason why the person or
3:35 the team
3:37 or the company that manages to do that
3:38 really well
3:40 in my view they should also be
3:41 millionaires or billionaires because
3:43 they you know they should be allowed to
3:45 make a huge profit from this
3:47 because they would have done something that's
3:48 that's
3:51 so so socially useful that uh
3:53 if it makes a difference they deserve to
3:55 have that money how much will each vaccine
3:56 vaccine
4:00 cost the short answer is
4:02 is nobody really knows for sure um
4:04 that's because a lot of the deals
4:05 involving the vaccine companies and
4:08 governments haven't been disclosed
4:09 either the amount that's been paid or
4:11 um the amount of doses that the
4:13 companies have bought
4:16 i i've seen estimates ranging from a few
4:18 dollars per
4:21 vaccine shot to a few tens of dollars
4:23 per vaccine shot there is some
4:25 uncertainty about the production
4:27 costs as well because some of the these
4:29 vaccines are very new they've never been
4:30 made before
4:34 so nobody knows exactly what the cost of
4:36 manufacturing will be i i expect it's
4:38 the case that in most countries
4:40 people receiving the vaccines won't have
4:42 to pay anything
4:43 for the vaccines they'll be given out
4:44 for free i mean that may not be the case
4:46 in all countries but
4:47 i presume that would be the case in most
4:50 countries i mean i think there's a case
4:53 an economic case at least to be made for um
4:53 um
4:55 if people are not taking up the vaccine
4:57 for whatever reason to actually pay
4:58 people to
4:59 to take the vaccine rather than to get
5:01 them to pay because
5:03 um the benefits of people taking the
5:05 vaccine are so big that it's
5:07 it could in theory be worth governments
5:08 actually paying people
5:11 to to take it what percentage of
5:13 americans do you estimate will choose
5:14 not to get vaccinated
5:18 and how much of an issue will this be
5:19 it's difficult to predict how many
5:22 people will choose not to get vaccinated
5:24 we've seen in this pandemic that there
5:25 is a lot of misinformation
5:28 floating around and that may impact the
5:30 uptake of an eventual vaccine
5:33 so it is indeed a real danger we know that
5:34 that
5:36 uh for her demonity with this coronavirus
5:38 coronavirus
5:40 we need something like 70 of people to
5:41 be vaccinated
5:44 or um at least the people who are most vulnerable
5:46 vulnerable
5:49 to the disease if they get infected but
5:51 that's certainly a concern that people
5:53 not just in america but in many other countries
5:54 countries
5:58 may just refuse to be vaccinated
5:59 and there are some concerns because
6:01 vaccine development right now is
6:05 growing at such high speed that
6:06 some people might think that you know
6:08 developers are cutting corners and the
6:10 vaccine may be less safe or something
6:11 like that so
6:15 that's definitely um a problem that may
6:16 come up
6:19 i agree that you can't predict uh how
6:19 many people
6:21 will be sure to take it but i mean the
6:23 survey evidence that we have is
6:25 actually not that encouraging if you
6:26 look at
6:28 say yougov and someone have have polled
6:29 people in different countries on
6:30 whether they would take a covered
6:32 vaccine and america comes out quite near
6:33 the bottom
6:35 with only about sort of 50 percent of
6:37 people saying that they
6:40 would definitely take a vaccine which is
6:42 far far from where you would need to be
6:43 if you wanted to be a
6:46 herd immunity in an ideal world how
6:48 should a vaccine be optimally distributed
6:50 distributed
6:53 in an ideal world the very first doses
6:54 of the vaccine
6:56 should go to health care workers and
6:58 social care workers
7:00 they're most at risk of contracting the
7:02 disease we already know that
7:04 from the first phase of the pandemic the
7:07 next batch of vaccines should go to the
7:08 people who are most vulnerable
7:11 of dying if they become infected we
7:13 already know that
7:15 elderly people and those with certain
7:16 chronic conditions are particularly vulnerable
7:17 vulnerable
7:20 and then everybody else should come
7:21 after that
7:23 will new versions of the vaccine be
7:29 nobody knows this isn't virus that
7:31 nobody knew about
7:34 six or seven months ago so it remains to
7:36 be seen whether it will turn out
7:39 to be something similar to the flu where
7:41 the virus changes so a new vaccine
7:44 has to be used every year slightly
7:45 tweaked in some form
7:49 or the same vaccine can be reused
7:52 if it turns out that it only provides
7:54 immunity of a limited duration
7:56 will developing countries receive equal
7:58 access to the vaccine
8:00 or will they be left behind well they'll
8:02 be left behind for sure
8:04 um but i don't think there's any doubt
8:05 about that unfortunately
8:08 at the moment at least the coverage for uh
8:08 uh
8:10 for the poorest countries of the world
8:12 is extremely poor
8:13 it also depends on where the
8:15 manufacturing facilities for the
8:17 vaccines are based
8:19 and we've seen in past pandemics for example
8:20 example
8:23 in the swine flu pandemic in 2009 the
8:26 rich countries hoarded supplies of the vaccines
8:27 vaccines
8:29 and developing countries did not get any
8:30 of them
8:33 pretty much until the pandemic was over
8:35 so if manufacturing facilities are based
8:38 in one country that does not want to
8:40 export the vaccine before it covers
8:42 its entire population and it happens to
8:44 be a particularly big country
8:47 then chances are that everybody else in
8:48 the world has to wait in line
8:51 particularly developing countries should
8:53 richer countries pay for vaccines in the
8:55 developing world
8:57 yes which country should pay for
8:59 vaccines in the developing world
9:01 um particularly for those countries
9:02 which are you know especially
9:05 poor and find it especially difficult to
9:07 pay for enough doses for their citizens
9:09 i think
9:11 rich countries can also help in a more
9:12 indirect way though
9:15 um and that is by putting a lot of money towards
9:16 towards
9:19 increasing the global supply of
9:22 vaccines clearly there are limits on on on
9:22 on
9:24 what can be produced in a year but the
9:25 way that um
9:27 the way i see it is that we need to be
9:29 going at this as
9:30 as fast as possible if you were to be
9:32 able to do that then you would have more
9:33 of a chance
9:36 of basically giving the world
9:38 a sufficient supply or vaccine or even
9:40 an oversupply vaccine which would be no
9:42 bad thing there is already a global
9:44 mechanism called gavi the global
9:46 alliance for vaccines
9:49 which funds vaccines for poor countries
9:51 for the standard childhood vaccinations
9:54 and the idea is that with this pandemic
9:55 the same
9:58 vehicle can be used for rich countries
9:59 to finance
10:02 the vaccine for the poor world how
10:04 should we respond to crises like this
10:06 one in the future
10:08 well the good news is that the world is
10:10 our is already quite prepared we
10:13 we saw this uh in the current pandemic
10:14 where vaccine manufacture vaccine
10:16 development research
10:19 started as soon as the genetic cult of
10:22 the virus was published back in january
10:24 we're probably going to have a vaccine
10:26 as soon as the end of this year
10:29 ready to go what more can be done in the
10:31 future it's difficult to predict
10:34 there are all sorts of viruses flu viruses
10:36 viruses
10:38 maybe another coronavirus that may come
10:39 about so
10:42 setting up some sort of vaccine
10:44 manufacturing capacity
10:47 in advance that's ready to go
10:53 could be something that countries should
10:56 think about for the next one
10:58 here at the economist we are working
11:00 hard to keep you informed on how the
11:02 covet 19 pandemic is unfolding
11:04 if you'd like to read our coverage of
11:07 the pandemic click on the link opposite
