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By Shubhangi Mathur, 5:57 PM ET
Pfizer Inc,BioNTech and Moderna Inc are expected to earn billions of dollars from COVID-19booster shots, said analysts and healthcare investors.
Drugmakercompanies have said earlier that to protect people from variants for a longerperiod of time, an extra dose of vaccines will be required.
The U.S.Food and Drug Administration on Thursday had authorized booster dose fromPfizer and Moderna.
As Deltavariants spreads globally, many governments such as Chile, Germany and Israelhave decided to provide booster doses to older people as well as people withweak immunity.
Pfizer andModerna have earned over $60 billion in sales of booster shots in 2021 and 2022.Analysts have forecast revenue of over $6.6 billion for thePfizer/BioNTech shot and $7.6 billion for Moderna in 2023, mostly from boostersales, reported Reuters.
Vaccine makers have argued the need of booster shots asevidence shows waning antibody levels in vaccinated people after six months andinfections through new variants.
Some research also suggests that Moderna vaccine is more effective than Pfizer vaccine against Delta variant.
On theother hand, the World Health Organization has asked governments to holdoff on booster shots until more people worldwide receive their initial doses.
We don't know what the market forces will be,Moderna President Stephen Hoge said in an interview.
At some point, this will become a more traditionalmarket - we'll look at what are the populations at risk, what value are wecreating, and what are the number of products that serve that value. That willultimately impact price.
(Withinputs from Reuters)
PictureCredits: Reuters