Is there no CasP analysis/research yet of the intersection of the Covid-19 pandemic and capital as power? Or have I missed it?
Eric Topol has asked:
“How can you go from sequence of a novel virus to 2 vaccines with 95% efficacy and safety (>75,000 participants in RCT trials) in 10 months and not, in 2.5 years, go after pan-β-coronavirus and nasal vaccines with the same aggressive (OWS) template?” – Eric Topol, Twitter.
(Eric Topal bio from his own site – “Founder and Director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, Professor of Molecular Medicine, and Executive Vice-President of Scripps Research. As a researcher, he has published over 1200 peer-reviewed articles, with more than 290,000 citations, elected to the National Academy of Medicine, and is one of the top 10 most cited researchers in medicine. His principal scientific focus has been on the genomic and digital tools to individualize medicine—and the power that brings to individuals to drive the future of medicine.”)
It’s a very good question he asks. We can look at possible answers from non-CasP and rather mundane perspectives to more CasP-type explanations (and research?) about corporate Big Pharma motivations. Thus:
1. Initial serendipity. A lot of groundwork research pre-existed as a jumping off point. Progress is now slower.
2. The new requirements are technically harder or even biologically impossible.
3. Not enough funding now by Pharma &/or Govt.
4. Big Pharma are happy where they are. Endless boosters for endless infections will be a continuing money spinner. They have no incentive to find a full cure. Only new state action and state funding will work.
Technical and biological hurdles (impossibilities) may be an issue of course. One, not in the know, can’t be sure. However, it seems to me Marx and Veblen would have recognized immediately the key possibilities of class-based, capital-based exploitation and sabotage being involved. Can CasP theory and research methods address this and extract any insights and findings? That is my question. Tell me if I am off-target in raising this and I will stop harping on it.