Foreign Affairs Committee on April 25th, 2022

[Kiersten Combs]

I do not have the price here right now. I would have to follow up.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

If you could provide that to the committee, Ms. Combs, it would be helpful.

Mr. Aboultaif, thank you very much.

Mr. Sorbara is next, please, for two minutes.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

I'll be short. Thank you, Chair.

I have a quick question. I just want to follow up on the issue of vaccine hesitancy, something that we deal with in developed and developing countries. I just want to say that I've had AstraZeneca as a first dose and Moderna as a second dose. With that, what are you folks seeing on the ground? What works and what doesn't work in getting over vaccine hesitancy?

[Fabien Paquette]

Kiersten, did you want to start?

[Kiersten Combs]

Yes, I'll start and then I'll turn it over to you.

Quickly, I have two observations. It's interesting, because as you have all self-identified what vaccine you've taken, I think that is a step in overcoming vaccine hesitancy in some way. It has become much more of a top-of-mind thought for all people everywhere as to what they get vaccinated against and how. The increase in public attention has helped with that.

I think we have more to do, and some of that is a balance in the media around how we talk about the risk and benefit of being vaccinated in any disease today, but specifically in this case.

Third, I think we do need to make a grassroots effort, and specifically in certain populations, to increase education.

[Fabien Paquette]

Absolutely. I think those were two fundamental elements that Kiersten talked about. Education is fundamental, and also making sure that immunizers have the education and capability to provide the vaccines to their population.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Given that the supply chain is being impacted both by COVID and now by the invasion of Ukraine by Putin, do you have any comments on production issues that you may or may not be having at this moment?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Make it just a brief answer, please.

[Fabien Paquette]

At this point in time, we have absolutely no issues with production. We can still supply the vaccines around the world.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much.

Go ahead, Mr. Bergeron. You have two minutes.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Combs, in response to a question from Mr. Aboultaif, you stated that at the worst moment of the crisis, you had adopted a policy of providing vaccines on a not‑for‑profit basis because you had received public funds to develop the vaccine. We know that Pfizer, for example, said that it never received any public money to develop its vaccine and that it made a profit of $37 billion U.S. in 2021 alone.

Why did you choose to move from a not‑for‑profit vision to one where it was possible to make a profit too?

[Kiersten Combs]

I'm assuming that question is for me.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Indeed.

[Kiersten Combs]

Through the entire pandemic stage, AstraZeneca offered the vaccine at no profit globally. That included a significant amount of donations that were made either through countries or directly on AstraZeneca's behalf. At the beginning of the year, as we moved into an endemic phase, we moved to tier pricing in countries that we have vaccine contracts with.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Does this change in your policy or practice correspond to the presumed loss of profits equivalent to the public subsidies? Did you decide that from that point on it was time to make a profit, since you felt you had taken into account the potential losses equivalent to the public contributions?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Please give a very brief answer.

[Kiersten Combs]

To briefly answer that, this change in pricing policy—which, by the way, still offers low-income countries a no-profit option, and we're still delivering it there—has happened in just the recent months, so there are no public financial implications that can be discussed at this time at a global level. We have to wait a little bit longer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Bergeron.

Ms. McPherson, you have two minutes, please.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you very much. Thank you again to the witnesses for being here today.

I wanted to follow up with our guest from AstraZeneca. She spoke about this being a humanitarian crisis. I greatly appreciate that, because I think we can all agree that this is a humanitarian crisis. The challenge we have with the rollout of the vaccines, of course, is that it very much appears as though the profit motive has trumped the humanitarian crisis and the need for people around the world to be able to access the vaccines.

I have to say that I am disappointed that you aren't able to share some of the numbers with us. I certainly look forward to receiving those numbers from you in writing at a later date. We do have information, or it's been reported, that Pfizer, for example, has made approximately $37 billion in profits with the COVID-19 vaccine. There's that, and also the public dollars that have gone into the development of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

I'm just wondering if either of you can talk a little bit about when it will be enough money for you, when it will be enough money that you will be able to give the vaccines to people around the world to ensure that they're available to them. My concern, obviously, is that right now we have lots of vaccines. We're experiencing hesitancy and we're experiencing other reasons for the vaccines being hard to get into people's arms, but we all know that at the beginning of this pandemic, there weren't enough vaccines. They went to wealthy countries. They went to countries that overlapped and took the supply from COVAX, and the pharmaceutical companies made massive profits.

If another pandemic or another variant of this pandemic was to come forward, how would we know that the exact same thing wouldn't happen in the future?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Be very brief, please.

[Kiersten Combs]

I think the entire industry and specifically our organizations have shown that we are in this fight with the entire system. The idea here is not necessarily to make money, per se, on the vaccine; it is to continue to invest in the development of our vaccines, as they, to your point, need to evolve. As variants come, it requires investment and an R and D perspective to actually be able to continue to evolve the vaccine to be effective.

I think there is a balance between how we continue to vaccinate the world and continue to make sure that we have medicine and good science that is evolving not only to treat the variant, but also to have, at some point, hopefully, an easier mechanism of delivery that is able to transport across the globe in a more efficient manner.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

We'll have to leave it there. Thanks very much.

Mr. Genuis, you have two minutes, please.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

This question is for both witnesses. We'll start with Ms. Combs.

A previous witness told us that the global distribution of vaccine is subject to indemnification clauses that countries have to sign on to, meaning that if something goes wrong, your companies are shielded from liability. People cannot sue if they experienced or perceive they have experienced vaccine injuries. Instead, any compensation would be paid out by a no-fault mechanism funded by COVAX, to which industry does not contribute. This witness further told us that you had asked for this protection as part of your agreements.

Could you please explain why your company asked for indemnification clauses, why public bodies should assume those liabilities, and whether these indemnification clauses would apply if information had been withheld by your company with respect to risks?

[Kiersten Combs]

I'm not privileged as to specifically the indemnification clause in the contract that you speak of. What I can say is that AstraZeneca stands behind our medicines and the safety profile of our medicines, and so—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Ma'am, I'm sorry to jump in, as the Canadian president of the company, are you telling me you're not aware of the details of the indemnification clauses? We were told that you asked for them, so why did you ask for them?