That's wonderful! The guarantees will give the drug companies incentive to sell to these countries at a relatively lower price than the free market will bear. Since there is not enough vaccine yet, even at incredible ramp-up speeds, the price in open bidding would be much higher. (I'd easily pay $1000 if that is what it took.)
Compared to drugs that much be taken continually, vaccines are not lucrative for drug companies. If Pfizer was just money seeking, they'd focus on better Rogaine etc., even in an epidemic, and indeed many drug companies did.
"Pfizer asked for additional indemnity from civil cases, meaning that the company would not be held liable for rare adverse effects or for its own acts of negligence, fraud or malice. This includes those linked to company practices – say, if Pfizer sent the wrong vaccine or made errors during manufacturing."
I cannot imagine what a mindset it takes to think that this is reasonable behaviour.
"Pfizer asked for additional indenmity from civil cases", but did not in e.g. Europe. This implies that Pfizer believes there is additional risk of South American liability cases, or an extended scope of what is considered adverse effects or negligence, etc.
If Pfizer sent the wrong vaccine it would liable in Europe too, so ignore that. You can't explain the difference between two cases using a common factor, you have to look for different factors.
"Pfizer asked for additional indemnity from civil cases, meaning that the company would not be held liable [...] for its own acts of negligence, fraud or malice. This includes [...] if Pfizer sent the wrong vaccine or made errors during manufacturing."
Sure. And if you buy a smartphone, similar issues exist in theory. "This includes […] if Apple sends an apple instead of an iphone or made errors during manufacturing." You'd take offense if it happened, too, but that possibility isn't one that makes smartphone manufacturers worry about liability and ask for indemnity.
Would you mind to rephrase? I am not sure what you are getting at here.
Pfizer was asking for indemnity from things that would be completely their fault and nobody elses.
Indemnity in case of rare adverse effects? Sure, this is a great idea as it might make the difference between getting actually getting vaccines and no company daring to touch vaccine development with a ten-foot pole.
Problems with fraudulent behaviour, negligence or malice on the other hand, that's should be their problem and theirs alone.
Pfizer asked for indemnity. The journalist supplied examples of what the indemnity might cover. Those examples are not attributed to Pfizer — you don't see phrase like "according to a Pfizer spokesperson, …". The wording doesn't even state that the examples are likely to be among Pfizer's motivating reasons, just that such things would be among the affected cases, should they occur.
It says one clear and attributed thing: "The government believed Pfizer should be liable for any acts of negligence or malice" and that Pfizer disagreed. That is, Pfizer believes that Prizer should be liable for only some acts of negligence or malice. I suspect there's some hyperbole, that the government doesn't really believe that any act of etc., but that the real core of the issue is in that area. What is an act of negligence, what acts of negligence are Pfizer's responsibility? I've heard about people getting fake vaccines in Brazil, that sounds like malice, is it Pfizer's responsibility, did Pfizer take sufficient steps to safeguard against that?
And so my initial assumption is that there are laws or have been some past judgments that Pfizer's lawyers believe pose undue legal risk in that jurisdiction. The article doesn't go into that at all, or into the question of the parties' actual motivations, which I find a bit disappointing, considering that phrase "investigative journalism" on the masthead.
Compared to drugs that much be taken continually, vaccines are not lucrative for drug companies. If Pfizer was just money seeking, they'd focus on better Rogaine etc., even in an epidemic, and indeed many drug companies did.