In connection with the puzzle of the missing solar neutrinos, it is important to know whether current theoretical estimates of the rate of the unmeasurably slow proton‐proton reaction, p+p →2H+e++&ngr;e, are reliable to within 10%, as assumed in construction of solar models. I find that a unitary transform of range 1 fm applied to typical phenomenological1S0p‐p and3D1deuteron radial functions can increase the S‐D non‐Born pionic exchange‐current term, which dominates the interaction‐current correction to the impulse approximation, by a factor of five. The resulting rate is 40% higher than the presently accepted value.