Pfizer CEO Announces Omicron Vaccine To Be Ready In March

The CEO of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, has said that a vaccine for the highly transmissible Omicron variant of Covid-19 will be ready in March and that the pharmaceutical company has begun manufacturing the doses.

“This vaccine will be ready in March,” Dr Bourla told CNBC. He added that they’re “already starting manufacturing some of these quantities at risk”.

Dr Bourla said that the vaccine will also be aimed at battling other variants of the virus. He acknowledged that it remains unclear if a variant-specific vaccine is needed but that the company has moved to create the vaccine because some countries want it to be available.

“The hope is that we will achieve something that will have way, way better protection particularly against infections, because the protection against the hospitalizations and the severe disease – it is reasonable right now, with the current vaccines as long as you are having let’s say the third dose,” Dr Bourla said.

A UK Health Security Agency study has shown that 20 weeks after the second dose, the vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna are only about 10 per cent effective at preventing symptomatic infection from Omicron, but the study also found that the vaccines do protect against severe illness. That study also found that booster shots are up to 75 per cent effective at stopping symptomatic infection.

In December, the Chief Medical Adviser to the President Dr Anthony Fauci said that an Omicron-specific vaccine would be unnecessary because the current booster shots provide sufficient protection.

The CEO of Moderna, Stephane Bancel, told CNBC on Monday that the company is working on an Omicron-targeting booster shot to be introduced this autumn that will soon start clinical trials. He added that demand for such boosters from governments is high.

Dr Bourla said it remains unclear if a fourth shot will become necessary and that Pfizer will conduct experiments on the issue.

In Israel, people over the age of 60 can now get a fourth shot of Pfizer’s and BioNTech’s vaccines.

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