Moderna Says Data Shows Its COVID-19 Vaccine Is 94.5% Effective

Earlier, Pfizer had announced on 9 November that their coronavirus vaccine was more than 90 percent effective.

US biotech company Moderna on Monday, 16 November, said that early data shows that their COVID-19 vaccine candidate is 94.5 percent effective, AFP reported.

The biotech company released an interim analysis on Monday, which said that based on a study of 95 patients with confirmed COVID-19 infections, the vaccine candidate had been found to have an efficacy of 94.5 percent.

"It was one of the greatest moments in my life and my career. It is absolutely amazing to be able to develop this vaccine and see the ability to prevent symptomatic disease with such high efficacy," said Dr Tal Zacks, Moderna's chief medical officer, according to CNN.

Moderna to Apply for Emergency-Use Authorisation

According to The Guardian, in the analysis, 90 of the patients had received the placebo, while the remaining five had received the vaccine.

Moderna will now apply to the US regulator, the Food and Drug Administration, for emergency-use authorisation in the coming weeks, the report further said.

The company also added that its vaccine did not have any serious side effects and that only a small percentage experienced symptoms like body aches and headaches, CNN reported.

However, according to The Guardian, the vaccine may not be available outside the US until 2021. Moderna reportedly said it would have 20 million doses ready to ship in the US before the end of 2020 and could be able to manufacture 500 million to one billion doses for the world in 2021.

Reuters reported that the Dow hits record high hours after Moderna announced the news about the vaccine.

Other Effective Vaccine Candidates

Moderna’s announcement comes on the heels of Pfizer and BioNTech announcing on 9 November that their coronavirus vaccine was more than 90 percent effective in preventing COVID-19. The COVID-19 vaccine being developed by Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE has reportedly prevented more than 90 percent of infections in a study with tens of thousands of volunteers.

Meanwhile, Russia’s sovereign wealth fund announced on 11 November that its Sputnik V vaccine is 92 percent effective at protecting people from COVID-19 according to interim trial results.

(With inputs from AFP, Reuters, The Guardian and CNN.)