Yet another promising news for a Covid-19 vaccine has been announced! Moderna said today that its vaccine has shown 94.5% effectiveness in preventing the virus, according to an analysis of its clinical trial.
The biotech company made the announcement earlier today, giving us a dash of hope amidst this coronavirus scare.
The news follows the announcement made by Pfizer and BioNTech, who said their vaccine was more than 90% effective.
The results come from interim analyses of intensive clinical studies. The clinical trials of Moderna saw the participation of 30,000 volunteers. Half got two doses of the vaccine 28 days apart, half got two shots of a placebo on the same schedule.
“This positive interim analysis from our Phase 3 study has given us the first clinical validation that our vaccine can prevent COVID-19 disease, including severe disease,” said Stéphane Bancel, chief executive officer of Moderna, in a statement.
Both companies used the same technology in making the vaccines, which is a tech based on a molecule known as mRNA, or messenger RNA. That molecule contains genetic instructions for making proteins inside cells.
We hope that by the end of this year, we can rest assured that a vaccine can soon end this pandemic.