Moderna Inc said on Wednesday it expects that the immunity induced by its coronavirus vaccine would be protective against the coronavirus variants reported in the UK.
“WE WILL BE PERFORMING ADDITIONAL TESTS OF THE VACCINE”
Moderna’s comments came amid the British government’s plan to place huge swathes of England under its strictest coronavirus restrictions as a highly infectious virus variant sweeps the country.
The company said it expects its vaccine, which was recently granted the US emergency use authorization, to be protective against the UK variant based on data to date.
“We have already tested sera from animals and humans vaccinated with the Moderna coronavirus Vaccine against a number of previous variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that have emerged since the first outbreak of the pandemic and found our vaccine to remain equally effective,” Moderna said.
The US-based company said it would be performing additional tests of the vaccine in the coming weeks to confirm its expectation.