Moderna said Monday that work on a Covid-19 booster shot is being accelerated to protect itself from the newly discovered variant in South Africa.
Her researchers said her current coronavirus vaccine appears to work against the two highly transmissible strains found in the UK and South Africa, although it appears to be less effective against the latter.
The two-dose vaccine produced an antibody response against multiple variants, including B.1.1.7 and B.1.351, which were first identified in the United Kingdom and South Africa, respectively, according to a study by Moderna. in collaboration with the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases. The study has not yet been peer-reviewed.
The vaccine generated a weaker immune response against the South African strain, but the antibodies remained above levels expected to be protective against the virus, the company said, adding that the findings may suggest “a potential risk of decreased immunity prior to the new B.1,351 strains.”
“For great caution and to take advantage of the flexibility of our mRNA platform, we are advancing to the clinic an emerging variant of reinforcement of the variant identified in the Republic of South Africa to determine whether it will be more effective to increase titers against it the possible future variants “, said in a statement the CEO of Moderna, Stephane Bancel.
Shares of Moderna rose nearly 4% in pre-market trading after the announcement.
Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Philadelphia Children’s Hospital, said he is pleased that Moderna is preparing for the possibility that the virus may mutate enough to evade protection from current vaccines.
“It’s not a problem yet,” said Offit, also a member of the FDA’s advisory committee on vaccines and related biological products. “Be prepared. Sequence these viruses. Be prepared in case a variant appears, which is resistance” to the vaccine.
On Thursday, the White House health adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci said new data shows that Covid-19 vaccines currently on the market may not be as effective at protecting against new, more contagious strains of the coronavirus. Some early findings published on the bioRxiv prepress server indicate that the South African variant may bypass the antibodies provided by some coronavirus treatments.
The Food and Drug Administration authorized the Moderna vaccine for people over 18 in December.
Moderna’s vaccine, like Pfizer’s, uses messenger RNA or mRNA technology. It is a new approach to vaccines that uses genetic material to elicit an immune response. Data from final-stage clinical trials published in November show that Moderna’s vaccine is more than 94% effective in preventing covidism, which is safe and appears to defend against serious disease. To achieve maximum effectiveness, the vaccine requires two separate doses for four weeks.
Bancel told CNBC that Moderna’s vaccine will be protective against the South African strain in the short term, but the company does not know how long that protection can last.
“What you can’t know now is what will happen in six months, twelve months, especially to the elderly because, as you know, they have a weaker immune system,” he said during an interview with Squawk Box “. “Because of this unknown … we decided to take a new vaccine at the clinic, with great caution.”
“We can’t be behind. We can’t stay behind this virus,” he said, adding that the virus “will continue to mutate.”
–CNBC’s Noah Higgins-Dunn has contributed to this report.