[News] Novavax coronavirus vaccine is 90% effective in clinical trial

[#Steeven.™]

The vaccine candidate against COVID-19 from the American company Novavax has an efficacy against the disease of 89.3%, but responds worse in those patients infected by the South African variant, the company reported on Thursday.

Novavax's COVID-19 vaccine prevents 90% of infections, including 85% of UK "supercovid" cases, but is only only 50% effective against the South African variant.

Preliminary data from the third and final phase of clinical trials is based on the results of trials in the UK with 15,000 volunteers and shows an efficacy of close to 90% after two doses.

Of the volunteers, 62 contracted COVID-19 and 6 of them had been injected with the vaccine candidate. About half of those infected were infected with the British variant.

The efficacy data are similar to those of vaccines already approved in the United States, developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

Trials also being conducted by Novavax in South Africa with 4,400 volunteers show a sharp drop in efficacy to 50%. Most of the volunteers had contracted the B.1.351 variant, known as the South African variant.

The study shows that the volunteers were infected with the new variant, even after contracting the coronavirus.

 

Phase 3 of the vaccine
The CEO of Novavax, Stanley Erck, recalled that they have been the first to carry out tests of phase 3 of the development of the vaccine with such a changing virus.

Erck acknowledged that "the level of change in the virus has been a surprise to everyone" and announced that he will expand his clinical trials in the African country to create a version of the vaccine only for the variant detected in that region.

The Novavax vaccine, which has received help from the US Government's Operation Warp Speed to combat the coronavirus, does not use messenger RNA technology, as in the case of Pfizer and Moderna, but instead uses the injection of coronavirus proteins to generate immune response, a more traditional technique.

Preliminary studies by Pfizer and Moderna also show a worse response to the South African variant and not so much to the British one, considered more contagious.