Malaria, Tuberculosis, Alzheimer’s disease, AIDS, Pandemic flu, Genital herpes, Urinary tract infections, Grass allergies, Traveler’s diarrhea. You name it, the pharmaceutical industry is working on a vaccine to prevent it. Many could be on the market in five years or less. Contrast that with five years ago, when so many companies had abandoned the vaccine business that half the U.S. supply of flu shots was lost because of factory contamination at one of the two manufactures left.
Vaccines are no longer a sleepy, low-profit niche in a booming drug industry. Today, they’re starting to give ailing pharmaceutical makers a shot in the arm. The lure of big profits, advances in technology, and growing government support has been drawing in new companies, from promising bio-techs to Johnson & Johnson. That means recent remarkable strides in overcoming dreaded diseases and annoying afflictions likely will continue. Vaccines now are viewed as a crucial path to growth, as drug-makers look for ways to bolster slowing prescription medicine sales amid intensifying generic competition and government pressure to cut down prices under federal health overhaul.
Investments in partnerships and other deals to develop and manufacture vaccines have been on a tear—and accelerating since the swine flu pandemic began. Billions in government grants are bringing better, faster ways to develop and manufacture vaccines. Rising worldwide emphasis on preventative health care, plus the advent of the first multi-billion-dollar vaccines, has further boosted their appeal.
While prescription drug sales are forecasted to rise by a third in five years, vaccines sales should double, from $19 billion last year to $39 billion in 2013, according to market research firm Kalorama Information. That’s five times the $8 billion in vaccine sales in 2004. That jump is due to a couple of new blockbuster vaccines and rising use of existing ones. The government’s list of recommended vaccines for children has more than doubled since 1985 to 17. It now also calls for a half-dozen vaccines for everyone over 18 and up to four more for some adults.
Tags: AIDS, Alzheimer's, Johnson & Johnson, Malaria, pharmaceutical industry, swine flu, Tuberculosis, vaccines
