I'm very curious what's going on here... Does the EU just have better negotiators? Did someone in the CDC get their pockets lined to accept a higher bid? Is there some law or contract which prevented the CDC from playing hardball?
USA is capitalist system. The price is whatever the free market pays.
There is a debate whether or not medicare / medicaid needs to begin negotiating the price with these companies. But even the idea of a central authority performing a large scale negotiation is seen as socialism in our political system and immediately dies.