Moderna Vaccine Believed to Be Effective on COVID Variant, Says Co

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Moderna Inc said on Wednesday, 23 December, that it thinks its vaccine candidate for COVID-19 will be effective against the strain of virus found in the United Kingdom, Reuters reported.

The company plans to test its efficacy against the virus in the coming weeks.

Moderna said, “We have already tested sera from animals and humans vaccinated with the Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine against a number of previous variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that have emerged since the first outbreak of the pandemic and found our vaccine to remain equally effective.”

Based on previous data, the firm believes its vaccine will be successful in immunising against the newest strain.

This comes after German pharmaceutical company BioNTech said that it has “scientific confidence” that their vaccine will work against the new variant.

“Scientifically, it is highly likely that the immune response by this vaccine also can deal with the new virus variants,” said BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin.

(With inputs from Reuters)