The pharmaceutical companies GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi sell many doses of vaccines at high prices
and do a lot of research with the profits, while the Serum Institute of India makes more doses than any other manufacturer and sells them at low prices, according to the first Access to Vaccines Index, which was released last week.
The new index is produced by the Dutch foundation that issues the biennial Access to Medicines Index, which ranks drug
manufacturers according to how easy it is for people in poor countries to get the companies’ lifesaving medications.
There are so few large vaccine companies, and their product portfolios are so diverse,
that giving each an overall ranking seemed unfair, said Jayasree K. Iyer, executive director of the Access to Medicines Foundation.
Also, children in rich countries get protection against certain diseases — like chickenpox,
German measles, rotavirus, pneumonia, flu and papillomavirus — that poor children do not.
The institute concentrates on vaccines recommended by the World Health Organization and sells 1.4 billion doses a year around the world.
A version of this article appears in print on March 14, 2017, on Page D6 of
the New York edition with the headline: A Global Ranking of Vaccine Makers.
So the foundation ranked each vaccine manufacturer on three criteria: research, pricing and supply.
Generous donor support has gotten vaccines for diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, polio, measles
and hepatitis B to more than 80 percent of the world’s poorest children.