Biotech company Moderna today (Monday 16 November) published positive efficacy results from its Phase 3 studies of its potential COVID-19 vaccine, showing it to be nearly 95% effective in preventing coronavirus.
A government spokesperson said:
The news from Moderna appears to be good and represents another significant step towards finding an effective COVID19 vaccine. As part of the ongoing work of the Vaccines Taskforce, the government is in advanced discussions with Moderna to ensure UK access to their vaccine as part of the wider UK portfolio.
Moderna are currently scaling up their European supply chain which means these doses would become available in spring 2021 in the UK at the earliest.
To date, the UK government has secured early access to 350 million vaccines doses through agreements with six separate vaccine developers. This includes 40 million doses of Pfizer/BioNTech's vaccine, which is based on the same platform as Moderna's vaccine and if approved by the medicines regulator, is expected to begin delivery as early as December 2020.
