Featured image source: Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
On Monday, 9th of November 2020, Pfizer and its partner BioNTech shared positive news, that world was waiting for in the face of a global pandemic. They release preliminary but promising results on the trial of the mRNA vaccine against covid-19. If successful, this will be a first-ever mRNA vaccine. Pfizer and BioNTech conducted a small trial and injected people with two doses of candidate vaccine at 3 weeks interval and found that it is 90% effective in preventing covid-19 infection and symptoms. Vaccinated people also didn’t develop any serious side effects.
For this vaccine to get use authorization, in accordance with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) guidelines, companies need to wait for at least two more months to see if any safety or adverse issues are observed in at least half of people after 2 months of the last injection. This vaccine offers huge promises, however, experts cautioned that similar to the flu vaccine, the first generation covid-19 vaccine may not be super protective. Pfizer is currently working on the stability of this vaccine along with other storage and handling issues and there are high chances that they will find solutions.