Pfizer, a pharmaceutical, said today its vaccine against Covid-19 is “90% effective“, according to the first interim analysis of its phase 3 trial. The vaccine is in the last stage before formally requesting its approval.
This efficacy against the virus was achieved seven days after the second dose of vaccine and 28 days after the first, the company said in a joint statement with the firm BioNTech, with whom it leads the project.
After examining 94 confirmed cases of coronavirus among more than 43,000 volunteers who received two doses of the vaccine or a placebo, it was found that less than 10% of those infections occurred in participants who had received the vaccine. Furthermore, the remaining 90% of those cases occurred in people who had received the placebo.
In this context, Pfizer said that the vaccine provided protection seven days after the second dose and 28 days after the initial dose. They also indicated that they plan to request authorization for emergency use from the United States Food and Drug Administration after the volunteers have been monitored for two months after receiving their second dose, according to what was published by CNN.
“We are closer to giving people around the world a necessary breakthrough to help end this global health crisis,” Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer expressed.
The firm expects to reach this point in the third week of November. Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech are the first drug manufacturers to show successful data from a large-scale clinical trial of a vaccine to stop the pandemic.
“With this news, we take a significant step closer to bringing people around the world a necessary breakthrough to help end this global health crisis,” said Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla. “We look forward to sharing additional efficacy and safety data in the coming weeks.”
In the official message, the company also indicated that it added a secondary endpoint to its study: it will test whether the vaccine protects people against severe Covid-19 disease and whether it can immunize long-term, even in previously infected patients.
