Moderna and Pfizer Call Updated COVID Vaccines Capable of New Variants

Illustration of COVID-19 vaccination. (Wikimedia Commons/MDGovpics)

JAKARTA - Vaccine manufacturers Moderna and Pfizer announced Wednesday that their updated COVID-19 vaccine produced a strong response in testing against the highly mutated BA.2.86 coronavirus subvariant, raising fears of a re-outbreak of infections.

Moderna said its vaccine produced an 8.7-fold increase in neutralizing antibodies against BA.2.86 compared with untreated natural antibody responses in human clinical trials.

The variant is currently being tracked by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

"We think this is the news people want to hear as they prepare to go out and get their fall booster drugs," Moderna's head of infectious diseases Jacqueline Miller said in an interview, adding that the data would also help reassure regulators, reported by Reuters, September 7.

Meanwhile, Pfizer said its latest vaccine with partner BioNTech produced a strong antibody response against BA.2.86 in preclinical studies in mice.

Previously, Moderna, Pfizer/BioNTech and Novavax had made versions of the vaccine aimed at the XBB.1.5 subvariant, the dominant variant throughout 2023. The vaccine is expected to be launched this fall.

Previously, the CDC indicated the BA.2.86 subvariant may be more capable of causing infections in people who have previously had COVID, or have been vaccinated with previous shots.

Meanwhile, the Omicron variant itself carries more than 35 mutations in key parts of the virus compared to XBB.1.5, the target of the updated injection.

Moderna said it had submitted new findings about its vaccine to regulators, submitting them for peer-reviewed publication. The retooled vaccine has not yet been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but is expected to be available later this month or early October.

Last month, Moderna and Pfizer respectively said their new vaccines appeared to be effective against a new subvariant of concern dubbed EG.5 in early testing.

The BA.2.86 subvariant has now been detected in Switzerland and South Africa as well as Israel, Denmark, the US and the UK according to a WHO official.

While it is important to monitor the variant, some experts say it is unlikely to cause waves of severe disease and death, due to the immune defenses being built up around the world due to mass vaccinations and previous infections.