Trump reportedly offered $1B to poach coronavirus vax for US use only

Enlarge / A man pipettes a blue liquid in a laboratory of the biopharmaceutical company Curevac in Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany, Feb. 24 2020. (credit: Sebastian Gollnow | picture alliance | Getty Images)

Scientists around the world are on the hunt for a vaccine to protect against novel coronavirus disease COVID-19-and apparently, the Trump administration has been trying to poach some of those scientists to make the United States first to market, should a vaccine successfully be developed.

German pharmaceutical firm CureVac since January has been researching a potential vaccine for countering the novel coronavirus that is grinding daily life in dozens of nations to a halt. Over the weekend, German newspaper Welt am Sonntag reported US President Donald Trump offered CureVac about $1 billion to obtain the vaccine "only for the United States." The report also said Germany was trying to counter-offer.

The offer "arose from a March 2 meeting" at the White House, The New York Times reported. President Trump as well as Vice President Mike Pence were in attendance for at least part of the meeting, as was CureVac CEO Daniel Menichella.

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