They had a staff of skilled people who had been working on the project for years, most likely in an (expensive) laboratory that was purpose-built for the task of producing a transgenic virus destined for humans.
It’s not cheap to produce at any scale, and it’s typically more expensive to do small-scale production.
A million dollars can barely fund a startup for a year; it’s insane to think you can maintain a drug production facility on a tiny budget like that.
But if making a small batch costs $1M, how do they afford to do the research for years in an academic setting?
> It’s not cheap to produce at any scale, and it’s typically more expensive to do small-scale production.
This is correct, but we're not speaking in relative terms, we're speaking in absolute terms. How can they afford to produce it in a lab (unless each research project has many, many millions to play with each year)? It doesn't seem logical to me.
It’s not cheap to produce at any scale, and it’s typically more expensive to do small-scale production.
A million dollars can barely fund a startup for a year; it’s insane to think you can maintain a drug production facility on a tiny budget like that.