Vaccines give new hope in Covid war

While it’s early days yet, the announcement that US biotech company Moderna’s experimental vaccine against Covid-19 is 94.5% effective is encouraging news in the fight against the pandemic.

Moderna made the announcement yesterday, based on preliminary analysis from a clinical trial, which compared volunteers who got a two-dose regimen of a shot to ones who got a placebo. The trial involved more than 30 000 participants.

This follows hot on the heels of a similar success story announced by American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, last week. It said its vaccine candidate has been 90% effective in preventing Covid-19 infections.

While the breakthrough is really promising, we can’t get ahead of ourselves just yet. Both vaccine candidates still need to secure regulatory approval and it could take weeks, if not months, before regulators review and approve the shots. Initial supply is expected to be limited. It’s also not clear who it will protect and for how long. Will they work for the elderly, the agegroup most vulnerable from Covid-19?

More than 54 million people have been infected by Covid-19 globally, with 1.3 million deaths reported. News of a vaccine could not come at a better time.

While there are still plenty of questions, it certainly gives us something to cheer about.

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