Thanks! I think I hold the “malaria vaccines could have been produced faster and could have reached more people by now” point fairly weakly. The stronger point I hold is “we can develop and produce more various critical medicines and vaccines, as well as make them cheaper, and we can do so without significant second-order effects (e.g. lower quality, vaccine hesitancy)”. I think there are many cases where we can confidently say more, bigger, faster, and cheaper even when we factor in second-order effects.
In most cases it’s not silly people slowing things, but sometimes it is indeed just institutional inertia or lack of non-silly rules that slow things.
In terms of products, lead chelation, and antivenom are clear cases where “please just produce more and cheaper” mindset seems pretty warranted. Lead chelation may be less cost-effective than lead exposure prevention, but I don’t see a reason for the broader global health ecosystem to prioritize it even if it’s not cost-effective enough for EA standards, as the current state of affairs seem extremely far from optimal.
Thanks! I think I hold the “malaria vaccines could have been produced faster and could have reached more people by now” point fairly weakly. The stronger point I hold is “we can develop and produce more various critical medicines and vaccines, as well as make them cheaper, and we can do so without significant second-order effects (e.g. lower quality, vaccine hesitancy)”. I think there are many cases where we can confidently say more, bigger, faster, and cheaper even when we factor in second-order effects.
In most cases it’s not silly people slowing things, but sometimes it is indeed just institutional inertia or lack of non-silly rules that slow things.
In terms of products, lead chelation, and antivenom are clear cases where “please just produce more and cheaper” mindset seems pretty warranted. Lead chelation may be less cost-effective than lead exposure prevention, but I don’t see a reason for the broader global health ecosystem to prioritize it even if it’s not cost-effective enough for EA standards, as the current state of affairs seem extremely far from optimal.