The British Pharmaceutical Group AstraZeneca claimed to have found, after further investigation, “The Winning Formula” for its vaccine against COVID-19, developed with the University of Oxford, which the UK regulator is due to comment on in the coming days.
“We believe we have found the winning formula and how to achieve efficacy that is as high as the other with two doses,” said CEO Pascal Soriot in the Sunday Times, adding that his vaccine has a “100% protection” against severe forms of COVID-19.
As interim results of large-scale clinical trials in the UK and Brazil, the UK lab announced in November that its vaccine had an average effectiveness of 70% compared to more than 90% for that of Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna.
Behind this average result are large differences between two different protocols: the efficacy is 90% for volunteers who first received half the dose, then a full dose a month later, but only 62% for another group who received two full doses.
These results were criticized for having an error in the half dose injection, although a relatively small group had followed this protocol. Then the company announced that his vaccine requires “further research”.
The Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine is eagerly awaited because it is relatively inexpensive and does not need to be stored as cold as, say, Pfizer / BioNTech, which must be stored at -70 degrees.
This facilitates vaccination on a large scale and in retirement homes.
The UK was the first Western country to start injecting doses of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine in early December. It now has this second Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine to gain momentum and end the proliferation of cases attributed to its territory by the new variant of the coronavirus.
Faced with this mutation, “we currently believe the vaccine should remain effective,” said Pascal Soriot. “But we’re not sure, so we’ll do some testing.”
He assured that new versions were being prepared just in case, hoping they won’t need them: “You have to be prepared.”
The UK government said on Wednesday that it had submitted full data for the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine to the UK regulator, the MHRA. According to the British press, the latter will have to speak out in the coming days, with the aim of injecting it from 4 January.