The percentage of waste was even higher at MedImmune Inc., which last year introduced a nasal-spray flu vaccine called FluMist. MedImmune had to throw away more FluMist than it sold because it made the mistake of pricing the product wholesale at $46 a dose when flu shots were going for $10 to $15.
This year MedImmune is pricing FluMist at $16 a snort wholesale on a non-returnable basis and $23.50 for sale on the usual understanding that what you don't sell, you can send back.
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That is old fashioned free-market economics at work, a demonstration of the concept of elasticity -- the higher the price of something, the less people ordinarily buy. Cut the price, sell more.
It's one of the few examples of economics working the way it's supposed to in the flu vaccine business.
"The market has failed," said Andrew Pavia, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Utah, who chairs the flu task force of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, based in Alexandria.
"We can lightly manipulate markets and produce market-driven solutions," Pavia said. "But I don't think the market by itself will answer the problem."
That the market has failed "seems to be the consensus" among flu experts, Pavia said.
Why doesn't the market work?
One reason is product liability, drug companies said, which keeps them out of the flu vaccine business. That is not a big issue, however, Pavia said, because lawsuits over flu vaccine have not been successful.
Another is the high cost of regulation and the high cost of building vaccine production facilities.
