Commentary

Whatís with the vaccine shortage?

Russ Roberts does a nice job of going through a WaPo article which seems to shed very little light on whyââ?¬â??even though lots of people want itââ?¬â??we don’t have enough flu vaccines to go around: Ah, reason number six. We’re about 3/4 of the way through the article, but now we find something that might actually explain what has changed about the vaccine business “Because much of the vaccine is bought in huge orders by government agencies, the price is low.” Roberts’ bottom line: the vaccine business is less attractive than it used to be. If we want to make it more attractive, either prices have to rise or regulations have to relax. My guess is we’re going to end up with more government involvement not less.