The adapted versions of established WHO warns against the use of 2 drugs for non-severe COVID-19 mRNA COVID-19 vaccines that address two variants in one shot will soon offer people better protection than vaccines that are now available, a European health official stated on Wednesday, according to Reuters.
Moderna and the BioNTech-Pfizer alliance are working on vaccines based on a combination of the original Wuhan virus and an Omicron subvariant.
Referred to as bivalent shots, these are planned for use in the autumn vaccination campaign.
While the existing coronavirus vaccines continue to provide good protection against hospitalization and death, vaccine effectiveness has taken a hit as the virus has evolved.
In recent days, EU officials have sounded the alarm on a new wave of COVID cases in the continent, and an increasing trend in hospitalizations, driven by the Omicron offshoot called BA.5.
"We project that by the end of this month the BA.5 sublineage will be the dominant variant in most of the EU countries," Pierre Delsaux, the director of EU's Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority, told members of the European Parliament in a hearing.
At this stage, no final decision has been made on which Omicron variant BA.1 or BA.4/BA.5 the autumn vaccine campaign should use since none of the shots has been yet endorsed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), he said.
"Whatever bivalent vaccine is finally available in Europe. It will be a good vaccine, it will be a better vaccine, even against BA.4/BA.5."
The EMA expects new COVID variant-adapted vaccines to be approved by September but signaled
on Friday that it is open to using shots targeting the older BA.1 variant for that campaign, given the shots targeting the newer BA.4 and BA.5 strains have only recently entered clinical development.
The new COVID wave is already happening, and because most people in that age group had their booster more than three to six months ago, the risk is now - and the adapted vaccines will likely only be available from September onwards, said Andrea Ammon, director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).
Referred to as bivalent shots, these are planned for use in the autumn vaccination campaign.
While the existing coronavirus vaccines continue to provide good protection against hospitalization and death, vaccine effectiveness has taken a hit as the virus has evolved.
In recent days, EU officials have sounded the alarm on a new wave of COVID cases in the continent, and an increasing trend in hospitalizations, driven by the Omicron offshoot called BA.5.
"We project that by the end of this month the BA.5 sublineage will be the dominant variant in most of the EU countries," Pierre Delsaux, the director of EU's Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority, told members of the European Parliament in a hearing.
At this stage, no final decision has been made on which Omicron variant BA.1 or BA.4/BA.5 the autumn vaccine campaign should use since none of the shots has been yet endorsed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), he said.
"Whatever bivalent vaccine is finally available in Europe. It will be a good vaccine, it will be a better vaccine, even against BA.4/BA.5."
The EMA expects new COVID variant-adapted vaccines to be approved by September but signaled
on Friday that it is open to using shots targeting the older BA.1 variant for that campaign, given the shots targeting the newer BA.4 and BA.5 strains have only recently entered clinical development.
The new COVID wave is already happening, and because most people in that age group had their booster more than three to six months ago, the risk is now - and the adapted vaccines will likely only be available from September onwards, said Andrea Ammon, director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).
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