Moderna coronavirus vaccine is 94.5% effective, company says
The Moderna trial includes over 30,000 participants in the US.
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Drug company Moderna on Monday said its COVID-19 vaccine is 94.5% effective, according to early results from its ongoing trial. Moderna is the second company to report positive preliminary data on a coronavirus vaccine. Pfizer last week revealed that its vaccine candidate is 90% effective.
"These are obviously very exciting results," Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN. "It's just as good as it gets -- 94.5% is truly outstanding."
The study, conducted in collaboration with NIAID and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, enrolled more than 30,000 participants in the US. The first interim analysis is based on 95 COVID-19 cases, of which 90 were in the placebo group and 5 in the vaccine group, Moderna said. A second analysis found 11 severe COVID-19 cases among trial participants, all of which were part of the placebo group.
Finding a vaccine for COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, is seen as the biggest hope for lifting the restrictions people around the world are living under. There are a number of efforts to find a viable vaccine underway in various countries.
During a press conference at the White House on Friday, US officials said they hope to have enough doses of a COVID-19 vaccine for 20 million Americans in December.
There have been more than 11 million coronavirus cases in the US, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, with more than 246,000 deaths. Worldwide there have been more than 54 million cases and 1.3 million deaths.
Moderna said it intends to submit for an Emergency Use Authorization with US Food and Drug Administration in the coming weeks.