Results from Moderna Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:MRNA) on the efficacy of its latest Covid jab provided encouragement – but now room for complacency ahead of a potential surge in winter infections.
Its latest booster iteration was shown to increase the immune defense against the Omicron variant (still around a third of reported cases in the US), but was less potent against the rapidly growing BQ.1.1 strain (a quarter of cases).
That said, the vaccine was still able to treat the new subvariant and the preliminary findings chime with a read-out released recently by the US giant Pfizer and BioNTech, the German drug developer that found the world’s best-selling Covid vaccine.
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Moderna’s president Stephen Hoge made these cautionary comments alongside the latest analysis, which was peer-reviewed and represented a small sample of those inoculated.
“Evolution is a dangerous thing to bet against,” he said. “The virus keeps surprising us, and we need to be ready to update the vaccine.”
Investors appeared heartened by the early Moderna booster results with the shares bid 5% higher in early trade.