Lisa Jarvis, Columnist

Pfizer’s Covid Windfall Creates New mRNA Opportunities

Pandemic products have given the company an extraordinary supply of cash, and the chief executive officer has good ideas for spending it.

February 8, 2022 at 9:41 PM UTC

By Lisa Jarvis

Lisa Jarvis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering biotech, health care and the pharmaceutical industry. Previously, she was executive editor of Chemical & Engineering News.

Moneymaker.
Photographer: Joel Saget/AFP via Getty Images

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Thanks almost entirely to its Covid vaccine Comirnaty and its Covid treatment Paxlovid, Pfizer has seen its full-year earnings more than double to $21.5 billion. Revenue for the year rose 92% to $81.5 billion.

Counting 2021 and the year ahead, the company stands to bring in at least $90 billion in sales from the two products. To put that windfall in context, 2021 peak sales of Abbvie’s arthritis drug Humira — which has long topped the list of annual drug sales — were $20.7 billion.