Drugs giant GlaxoSmith-Kline is cashing in on demand for its swine
flu vaccine, revealing it has won a further 22 government orders in
the past two months.
This takes the total number of doses ordered for the H1N1 vaccine
from the company to 440m, worth some £2.2bn. The pharmaceuticals
group now has orders from 72 governments around the world, including
Japan and China.
In its latest update, Glaxo said an additional 149m doses had been
ordered since August 4, indicating the group is in line for a big
profit windfall because of the pandemic.
Kevin Wilson, analyst at Citigroup, said: 'We believe that pandemic sales will lead to potential earnings surprises through the fourth quarter of 2009 to the second quarter of 2010.
