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Moderna, a US biotech company, reported Monday that its vaccine was 94.5% effective in preventing COVID-19, according to interim data from an advanced clinical trial. Several experts and public health experts have already responded to the Moderna news, which they consider “excellent”.
Eleanor Riley, professor of immunology and infectious diseases at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, says “the safety data looks promising.” “The side effects of vaccination appear to be in line with those normally seen with other adult vaccines, including vaccination against seasonal influenza,” he added in statements to the agency. Reuters.
Moderna is conducting a clinical trial, with the participation of 30,000 people, in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health of the United States, with half of the participants receiving the vaccine and the other half receiving placebo.
“Although the numbers are small, this trial also gives an indication that vaccination is effective in older people and prevents serious diseases,” said the expert, who notes, however, that it is not yet known whether the vaccine “prevents transmission of diseases “.
But overall, this is excellent news. Having more than one source of an effective vaccine will increase the global supply and hopefully help us all get back to normal in 2021, “he emphasized.
Also Trudie Lang, director of the Global Health Network in the Nuffield Department of Medicine, Oxford University, UK, considers this to be “very good news”.
“This is an interim analysis, which means that there were enough cases within the vaccinated volunteers to give this statistical significance,” he told the Reuters. “These early results suggest that there was representation in different age groups and communities,” he said.
Thus, Trudie Lang believes that the announcement “is really encouraging and also shows that a vaccine against COVID-19 is a real probability and that having more than one provider should help ensure a better and more equitable global availability.”
Modera became the second US company to report results that exceed expectations for the effectiveness of a vaccine against the new coronavirus, after Pfizer.
Stephen Evans, professor of pharmacoepidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, highlights the vaccine’s effectiveness rate, well above the 50% requested by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the drug’s regulatory authority for the north. -American.
“The variety of reported side effects is not surprising and is typical of almost all vaccines. These reactions tend to be local, that is, where the injection was given and are rarely long-lasting or severe, ”he said. Moderna reported effects such as injection site pain (in 2.7% of those vaccinated), fatigue (nearly 10%), joint pain (5%), and headache (4.5%).
“Although it has reported an efficacy greater than 94%, there is statistical uncertainty; but based on these data, the probable effectiveness will be higher than 85%, which would be higher than what most scientists would have expected ”, he justified.
Finally, Peter Openshaw, Professor of Experimental Medicine at Imperial College London, United Kingdom, also considers that the news “is tremendously exciting and considerably increases optimism that we will have good vaccines in the coming months”.
Moderna announced that its vaccine can be kept in a conventional freezer (-20 degrees) for up to six months and, once thawed, the vaccine can be kept for up to 30 days in a standard refrigerator (between 2 and 8 degrees). “This makes the vaccine much easier to administer,” he said.
According to the expert, “in terms of side effects, the news is also quite good.”
Modern vaccine for covid-19 is 94.5% effective, says company
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