GullahGullahIslander
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Feb 19, 2026 1:14 PM
GullahGullahIslander
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akafluffy
Moderna coming out and saying they're scalping Americans so much that 5% of the worlds population accounts for wether or not their stuff makes money is wild.
prolorus
There is a relationship between Parkinson and melanoma
Urgalicity
It should be illegal for pharmaceutical companies to be for profit.
19marcurious57
Wtf, Epstein even corrupted the medical world?
DesdemonaMoor
Successful trial data leads to more awards (funding) so this is particularly tragic from an infectious disease (which has a direct correlation to cancer) research perspective.
psugab
Some of this is from last November, but I'm not seeing that quote or a good source for all three
EroticZombiePants
Of course Trump would push to block the release of anything that combats something with the name Epstein in it.
Strategicgnomer
Which is why such companies need be nationalised.
OceanCitySoul
There is a virus named after Jeffrey Epstein and Bill Barr? /s
TheDoctorCrankenstein
In layman's terms
"Regardless of any benefits to society that would be possible from the fruits of this labor, we are deciding to halt all development because we can't make obscene profits off of this."
This is why private ownership over means is fucked up.
Fuck anyone who says capitalism breeds innovation. Explain this then, shit heels. Actively stifling medical innovation solely because it isn't able to make rich fucks richer.
makesense
FDA reversed course and will review Moderna's flu vaccine. https://www.npr.org/2026/02/18/nx-s1-5718116/fda-moderna-mrna-flu-shot
EroticZombiePants
Basically, without the gouging of the USA effectively propping up socialized medicine throughout the World, the only way to sustain the costs of medical research and development would be through continuous grants from various governments. This basically means us Americans being royally fucked over keeps much of the rest of the world's taxes down.
boobsalot
Impeach RFKjr !
stayingalive4life
To them, it’s why spend the money to find a cure when there’s more profit to be made in treating the illness?
whatsisname
Except that development of these vaccines was well underway, they were already spending money to work on cures until worm-brain got in charge.
chuckaholic
Moderna lost access to the US market?
DevilsAdvocat
this has a possibility of being reversed soon due to this /gallery/this-is-what-passes-as-good-news-ill-take-zEnSr2U
Hovencl00f
RFK, Jr is an incompetent crackpot. Many people will die due to his crackpottery.
westellar
The *really* stupid as fuck thing is that the "investment" is likely covered by taxpayers to begin with. I'd love to see an accounting for exactly how much they pay out of pocket as opposed to grants, subsidies, or whatever other excuse is given for shoving their pockets full of taxpayer money just so they can turn around and price gouge us on lifesaving medication.
daguq
If you translate "You cannot make a return on investment" from corporate speak, it reads: "You cannot price gouge and make obscene profits".
ourari
"It's still a viable business case, but there's just not enough yacht money."
yalczero
"We had to settle for a 100-ft yacht rather than a 105-ft yacht. We truly live in a communist country now."
MightyIink
If the US gets to keep making world changing decisions then the rest of the world should be allowed to vote in their elections.
marsilies
Russia and Israel figured out a way. It's those silly ethics that's stopping your country from doing similar.
khaoselement
Fucking hell people. Moderna isn't to blame here. The FDA fucked them out of something like $750 million. Moderna did nothing wrong. Fuck 47 and all his fucking dog shit Nazi bootlicking toadies that caused this.
rbudrick
Nothing wrong. Ok. Big pharma boots delicious?
khaoselement
Haha, anybody who maligns the nefarious "big pharma" is an idiot not to be engaged with. Go suck down some more essential oils you moron.
rbudrick
Look what coward mcmagaface posted and deleted.
MoonMoon89
"It's just not financially responsible to reduce suffering and death." /s
TheOncelor
*fiscally advantageous.
psugab
No /s, that's literally what the CEO is saying.
Goldensands
It's almost as if capitalism is wrong or something
CookieMonstersCrumbs
The amount of people who are coming up EBV active after covid is spiking. EBV is something we all ended up having and not knowing and it sleeps until it gets triggered. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9529843/ It leads to other things, like Cancer, MS, Parkinson's, dementia, and other happy autoimmune diseases that just gener">generall">ther happy autoimmune diseases that just generally fuck you up. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9529843/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus
CookieMonstersCrumbs
posted a link twice, damnit
EveryBodyLovesMe
Not ONE but TWO links! You sir come prepared! (I realize it’s the same link, don’t care, you brought it with you twice)
CookieMonstersCrumbs
If you count that, then I brought THREE
lightfoot2
Thank a MAGA rat today.
ac0lyte
With a brick!
eastend666
Personally, I avoid them like the plague.
ToSisPoS
“In other news, instances of the plague are on the increase is vaccine-wary Oregon…”
LicensedAdHominem
Noticed recently "plague rat" became an algo-moderated phrase on the facebook ecosystem. But spreading calls for violence against minorities is okay.
eastend666
I'm glad someone is up to the minute on these things. There are too many ecosystems to keep track of.
bikergeek6249
Doing anything else would render them subject to Trump's weaponized DOJ and other barratry and lawfare, including ruinous civil lawsuits. Meta and/or Zuck may be rich but the US Govt. has literally bottomless resources. They can outlast and outspend Meta or any other company.
LicensedAdHominem
I still call them degenerate disease vectors and anti-life worm-brained death cultists.
SomeDetroitGuy
Weird how many are blaming only the company and not the Administrarion that is prohibiting them from releasing the vaccines once made.
kanybal
I do think it is a problem that Big Pharma doesn't think a vaccine is worth making if they can't scam Americans for thousands of dollars a shot. Meaning that we all (in the free and socialist world of healthcare) are reaping profits from the horrific American system. Something needs fixing
EroticZombiePants
Weird how we aren't making a bigger deal about the fact prescription drug prices in the USA are so very high it literally props up the entire rest of the world.
onecowboytoo
Not only that, but much of the research is funded by government grants.
CelestialSea
If they've already put that much research in then their excuse is flimsy as hell. My guess is this move is just to pressure the US government and they DGAF if other people suffer.
therandombagofmeat
I think that’s a more important reason for stopping investment than the ROI. The government is absolutely anti-vaccine.
ScrotusFezziwig
I'm pretty sure everyone is picking up on that sentiment
fractalsphere
The US market is like 4% of the global population. Is that price-gouging from pharma companies really enough to SCREW OVER THE REST OF THE WORLD?
psmith00
yes.
FaecalJacksonPollock
Capitalists would screw over the world for a single dollar.
Shaodyn
They'd do that for a Klondike bar.
AgainstMethod
US price gouging literally subsidizes much of global healthcare, yes.
Californiajackson
Oops.
pinkclouds94
The US is the ONLY market where they're able to make a profit. Every other country in the world places caps on what price they can charge for medicines. The US does not cap, and that's why most Americans aren't able to afford life saving medicines.
cdlong
At that level of price gouging? Yes. Yes it is.
PanNonOpticon
Africas average income is about $2-3k per year.
Only about 10% of world have a disposable income high enough to be able to pay for the developmet costs. If you leave US out, that's about half of the money gone.
BeardicPerformance
4% of the global population but the only major country that lets them sell their meds for as much as they want. I’d bet that the US is much closer to a majority of their profits than just 4%.
nichfra
It's actually an absolute majority by revenue.
BeardicPerformance
Unfortunately for all of us, corporations have been price gouging the fuck out of Americans to make all their money while everyone else got the same meds for cheap. Now that they can’t rip off Americans, they can’t make enough money for it to be worth producing those meds.
We need a better system GLOBALLY for medical research and production that doesn’t rely on one country’s anti-consumer laws to subsidize the whole world.
Cats2cats
It is if they are loosing research funding & the ability to inflate prices. Somebody has to subsidize R&D along with the quarterly dividend. I’m waiting to be informed that my drug; IVIG is being removed from my insurance formulary. Last year I cost them $250,000. Once they remove me I will slowly become a drug addict due to the level of pain CIDP can cause. I never want to experience that again.
StellarJay77
It's not at all about the number of people but the number of dollars and in that respect the US is huge. So to answer your question, yes, it is that much of a difference to screw over the entire world.
nichfra
Yes. The US market is by revenue >50% of the world market. Us Europeans don't like to hear it but those ridiculous prices the US is paying kind of is supporting us by financing development. We're only an afterthought.
JoyfulStrawberrySalad
We aren't financing development as much as we are financing CEO salaries and shareholder dividends
nichfra
The fact that modern stopped trials because they aren't sure they can sell it to the US shows that you finance development.
cdlong
Epstein-Barr Virus sounds like something else.
EveryBodyLovesMe
It’s Mono. The thing some 80% of people catch before they are 15 years old or something.
GeneralAnubis
Sometimes the universe has a sick sense of humor. That or the simulation is running out of processing power
eetsumkaus
especially considering Donald Barr gave Epstein his first job
cyrusthevyrus
Glad I'm not the only one. I thought this was some kind of satire about Jeffrey Epstein and Bill Barr until I looked it up. It is a real virus discovered in 1963 by Sir (Dr.) Michael Anthony Epstein, Dr. Yvonne Barr, and Dr. Bert Achong.
Interesting trivia about Dr. Barr... Shortly after publishing their discovery, she got married and moved to Australia. She couldn't find a research position, so she spent the rest of her career teaching high school science.
eetsumkaus
the unfortunate reality of working in research. It's largely dependent on connections. She had to have known it would be rough going for her, and she went anyway.
cyrusthevyrus
Yeah, it was unfortunate for her (though there's no mention about how she felt about teaching high school science)...but think of how cool it would be to have a science teacher with that kind of accomplishment.
cyrusthevyrus
Forgot the link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus
lostinthoughts
I do understand now why Infectious mononucleosis was mentioned when I was diagnosed with rheumatic arthritis.. oh my god
CheeseCoffeeChests
In germany we say "Der Markt regelt das." (The market regulates it.) whenever neo-liberal economy fails.
tentacularfleshscape
The invisible hand of the free market can fondle my fuckin balls
CheeseCoffeeChests
Hi Christian
tentacularfleshscape
Lol idk why Christian and I don't read German but I'm guessing this guy is some capitalist scumbag and the caption is more or less what I said?
CheeseCoffeeChests
crotch instead of balls. Christian Lindlner, he was former minister of finance and head of the FDP a neo-liberal party (which was actually decent 20-25 years ago because beside of beeing liberal in a economy sense they also valued personal liberty and rights but that got less and less). Well... the market handled them... FDP is not in the parlament anymore because not enough people voted for them. Guy has no clue of economy in any shape or form.
tentacularfleshscape
Appreciate the context
FetaForMoses
No ROI… May history remember you terribly.
SalmySwims
I was very confused for a second because to me, ROI is "Release of Information"
DanielAsparagus
Unfortunately it literally can’t be done without some benefit to the manufacturer. We’ve designed the system this way.
CallMeCourierSix
Fuck you. The problem is that Trump has forbidden mRNA vaccines from being sold in the US.
Get pissed at Trump for fucking all of us over.
If you want to be pissed that Moderna is a capitalist corporation, that's a whole different problem.
MrRandom314159
Honestly, they're a private company. If they lose enough money, the vaccines in totality stops. It's up to the government to ensure health.
usernameusedinlessplatforms2
Which is why Univerisities does the brunt grueling parts of the medical studies and then pharmaceutical companies makes them in to products.
So goverment billions has already been poured in to these.
khaoselement
The FDA fucked them out of $750million. How exactly do you expect them to fund the research they do if they can't make money? Capitalism sucks but this is a lot simpler than that.
OMFGWhatHaveWeDONE
The christo-fascist, anti-science Republicans are killing off science by defunding it? Who could have guessed?
level5detentionblockAA23
You have to be able to covers your costs somehow…
pictory
The names of those making these decisions... That should come out
PanNonOpticon
Kennedy, Trump and Vinay Prasad, there is your list.
JohnnyPumpkinStar
They are a for-profit public pharmacy company. This is on us, our government, and the systems we created, not them. They literally legally aren't allowed to continue non-ROI operations.
IconicM
Even if they weren't for profit you need to cover expenses, losing money making something just means eventually going out of business and then *all* the medicine goes away.
RAJrios
You understand that putting shareholder profits above the good of all humanity is worse, right?
Hoogemast
Even worse. A lot of for profit organizations get a lot of funding from both the governments as well as the public. Then they use that to develop a medicine and then just rake in all revenue. I almost get the feeling they are saying this to try and get more funding.
michiyl
And again, capitalism kills and maims humans because it wasn't profitable to do otherwise
CptChunk
I’ve honestly sat on the thought of how if they’re so willing to kill people off, how can you make drain the people wallets if they’re dying left and right and can’t even pay for what you’re trying to financially strip from them? Wouldn’t you want them alive for their return on investment. I’m just being facetious but that just sounds like bad business practice.
ProjectDA
my favorite is people will point to russia and china as to why 'socialism/communism' doesnt work or how many people died. you point out how many capitalism kills but they retort 'those are different!'. point out flaws in cap, 'thats becayse we are a true cap. people will do all they can to defend a system they would hate if its name was different.
ElbowDeepInAHeadlessHorseman
This circumstance is very very specifically about Trump, RFK, and the anti-vax movement. If Kamala was president this wouldn't have been halted even though it's under a capitalist system.
Cornflakes91
because the capitalist incentive to do the right thing would have remained intact.
TMCybersnark
And what do you think ultimately *created* Trump and his administration?
ElbowDeepInAHeadlessHorseman
A global pedophilia ring?
pnersvfu
Rugged individualism, which appears to me how a lot of people interpret the zero sum of capitalism. A very big case of 'fuck you, got mine'
nclu
You can't conduct research without the funding to cover it, and unfortunately that's how it works. If the FDA won't approve the results, let alone be willing to pay for it, then it won't happen. This would be the same if there wasn't any capitalism going on at all. If the government wouldn't fund/support it under not-capitalism it won't happen. So much medical research has been funded through the FDA and the American customer, hopefully other countries will step it up while we're in the woods.
usernameusedinlessplatforms2
Most of these studies and medical research in general is done in universities and then given over to pharmaceutical companies to make a market ready product and manufacturing..
onecowboytoo
See the Government give grants to the companies and the companies sponsor the research at the schools.
DefinitelyNotMadeOfBees
That's not really true. The work to take a promising molecule and perform the testing, formulation, dose planning, etc is a MASSIVE undertaking.
nclu
Not without those NIST grants, and not without FDA approval
usernameusedinlessplatforms2
As an example: One Clinical trial for epstein-barr vaccine was done by Chinese University of Hong-Kong (NCT01094405)
Other was Cancer Research UK (NCT01147991)
And the research to reach trials was done in Guanxi Medical University (grant numbers 82272736, 82160467, 81460460, and 81760542)
Sorry.
DanielAsparagus
Did you complete a research masters? Is it in the room with us? Surprisingly jack shit happens at a lot of colleges. The publish or perish model is a fucking circle jerk. You’d really hope something good happens, but a lot of it is research for publications to drive subscriptions to journals that are meaningless.
usernameusedinlessplatforms2
As an example: One Clinical trial for epstein-barr vaccine was done by Chinese University of Hong-Kong (NCT01094405)
Other was Cancer Research UK (NCT01147991)
And the research to reach trials was done in Guanxi Medical University (grant numbers 82272736, 82160467, 81460460, and 81760542
Chrondeath
Doesn't shingles have a vaccine already?
FlyingButtPliers
Yes, but all these viruses are part of the same family. Herpes simplex viruses include chicken pox which eventually wakes up and becomes shingles, genital herpes, hsv-1 or 2, epstein-barr and other rarer forms. It sounds like they had something promising for the whole family of viruses which cause a number of diseases and most people have them and they are dormant until they aren't. This is a huge loss.
nihiltres
Yes, but it’s limited to older people, IIRC ≥55.
I’ve had shingles—thankfully a mild case caught very quickly—but since I’m under 40, I can’t get the vaccine. If a new vaccine would become available to younger people, I’d be all over it.
shalafi71
Got mine around 50yo.
Chrondeath
Does the age limit have something to do with the vaccine itself, such that we would expect a better vaccine to have a lower age limit? I assumed that the age limit was set because that's the age that people are expected to start developing shingles.
nihiltres
I seem to recall (read: take with more than a few grains of salt) that there are open questions about whether you can meaningfully *boost* the vaccine, i.e. if you get it in your 30s and it’s lost much of its effectiveness once you’re in your 50s, you might be out of luck, so taking it later when your baseline immune system is weaker is a better bet against the disease.
Smallfuzzycreaturefromalphacentauri
Yes it does, my booster is scheduled in two weeks and apparently the after effects are not nice.
SuperfluousMeh
I just got my 2nd shingles yesterday and it was a breeze. My arm's a little sore. I was expecting to feel like the flu but I'm fine. Hope you have the same experience!
Smallfuzzycreaturefromalphacentauri
I hope so too, COVID boosters are the ones that usually knock me out, sometimes for two days
Hovencl00f
It does, and I took it, and it works.
Type17
Wife & I had second of two shots against shingles a few weeks ago - felt tired and achy the day after and into the next day, and injection site in upper arm was tender too, but well worth it, considering the general experience of shingles itself. Take the next day off if you can.
Smallfuzzycreaturefromalphacentauri
Well, I’m gonna take the Friday off anyhow as I am traveling for work all Tuesday and by law that is considered work time. It’s gonna be a short week
Type17
Well, you'll be fine by Sat evening at the latest (assuming it's a similar vaccine). PS: According to recent studies, having a shingles vaccine lowers your chances of developing dementia in later life by 20%, which is considered statistically significant.
arajad
I had TDAP and shingles vaccinations at the same time, and one or both had me feeling punky for a few days. But trust me: Actually having shingles is a LOT worse.
Smallfuzzycreaturefromalphacentauri
I had shingles a few years ago, it was like someone was pouring boiling water on my legs
SuperfluousMeh
Shingles is the one that scared me because covid was causing younger folks to have breakouts and so I begged my doctor for shingles even though I'm still too young and I'm thankful that she relented.
nihiltres
Oof. I had a case around the same time but was lucky enough to catch it quickly so that it was more “hours-old burn” pain. My luck was that my SO is a genius and recognized that my “nasty bug bites” followed nerve lines after I noted that they weren’t responding to diphenhydramine. I sent my doctor a photo, they confirmed, and I started valacyclovir later that day.