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By Tim Smith
(Bloomberg) — Existing vaccines will be less effective at
tackling Omicron than earlier strains of Covid-19 and it may
take months before pharmaceutical companies can manufacture new
variant-specific jabs at scale, Moderna Chief Executive Stephane
Bancel said in an interview with the Financial Times.
* The high number of Omicron mutations on the spike protein,
which the virus uses to infect human cells, and the rapid spread
of the variant in South Africa, suggested the current crop of
vaccines may need to be modified next year, Bancel told the
newspaper
* “There is no world, I think, where [the effectiveness] is the
same level… we had with Delta,” he told the Financial Times in
an interview at the company’s headquarters
* Scientists were worried because 32 of the 50 mutations in the
Omicron variant are on the spike protein, which the current
vaccines focus on to boost the human body’s immune system to
combat Covid-19, according to Bancel
** Most experts thought such a highly mutated variant wouldn’t
emerge for another one or two years, he added
* Bancel said data giving an indication of how the existing
vaccines perform against the Omicron variant, and whether it
causes severe disease, should become available within two weeks:
FT
** It will take several months before an Omicron-specific
vaccine could be produced at scale and there might be a case for
giving more potent boosters to the elderly or people with
compromised immune systems, Bancel said
* Moderna could make a total of 2b-3b doses in 2022
** But it would be risky to shift Moderna’s entire production
capacity to an Omicron-targeted jab at a time when other
variants are still in circulation, the FT reported, citing
Bancel

NOTE
* Moderna Inc. rose 11.8% to USD369 as of last close
** The average 12-month price target of $275 is 25% below the
current price
** 9 buys, 5 sells, 5 holds

To view the source of this information, click here

To contact the reporter on this story:
Tim Smith in Sydney at tsmith58@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Michael Sin at msin12@bloomberg.net
Max Zimmerman