I think we'll have to go back to the early days of the company. In passing, I'm not involved in any way with this company. I have no shares in the company and no particular axe to grind about what it does.
Based on what I know, in the early start‑up phases of any project, you tend to take whatever capital might be on offer.
In this instance, I would imagine that Philip Morris International felt there was an affinity of some kind with the plant being used to manufacture the vaccine. The plant is in the same family as tobacco, and this meant an affinity for the company.
I'm not going to cast the first stone at Medicago, because I'm aware of what it's like to start up a biotechnology company. At the outset, Medicago was a small biotech company that got its start in the university community. It grew and needed capital to develop. I don't think Medicago was wrong to do so. This was the capital that enabled it to develop.
Later on in the vaccine's development, could the actuarial structure of the company have been reviewed, knowing that the WHO would apply this provision? That's an important question that needs to be asked.