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Where's The Vaccine? : Planet Money Coronaviruses didn't come out of nowhere. They've actually been around for years. But economics makes it hard to find a vaccine. | Subscribe to our weekly newsletter here.

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Where's The Vaccine?

Where's The Vaccine?

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A laboratory technician injects Influenza A (H1N1) virus into a tray of embryonated hens' eggs during vaccine research work at the Torlak Institute of Virology in Belgrade, Serbia, on Tuesday, March 3, 2020. Photographer: Oliver Bunic/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Bloomberg via Getty Images
A laboratory technician injects Influenza A (H1N1) virus into a tray of embryonated hens' eggs during vaccine research work at the Torlak Institute of Virology in Belgrade, Serbia, on Tuesday, March 3, 2020. Photographer: Oliver Bunic/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Bloomberg via Getty Images

COVID-19 isn't the first coronavirus outbreak. It's actually the third in the past 18 years, following SARS and MERS.

And you would think that with all the drug makers in the world, at least one would have come up with a vaccine by now — because it seems like they would have a lot of customers. But the market for emergency vaccines isn't like a regular market... it's a lot weirder than that.

In this episode, we meet the guy who's supposed to save us all, we explore how vaccines are made and why they take so long to make, and why you can't just walk into Walgreens and buy one. Yet.

Music: "Death Over Dinner," "Doctor Dizzy,"and "Edge Of Fear."

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