Clinical trial evaluating Moderna's Covid-19 variant vaccine starts in US
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The trial will enrol about 210 healthy adult volunteers at four clinical research sites in the US.
PHOTO: AFP
WASHINGTON (XINHUA) - A new phase one clinical trial has started in the United States to evaluate Moderna's investigational vaccine which is designed to protect against the B.1.351 coronavirus variant, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced on Wednesday (March 31).
The trial, led and funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the NIH, will evaluate the safety and immunogenicity of the vaccine, known as mRNA-1273.351, in adult volunteers.
The trial will enrol about 210 healthy adult volunteers at four clinical research sites in the US, according to the NIH.
"The B.1.351 Sars-CoV-2 variant, first identified in the Republic of South Africa, has been detected in at least nine states in the United States," said Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
"Preliminary data show that the Covid-19 vaccines currently available in the US should provide an adequate degree of protection against Sars-CoV-2 variants," Dr Fauci said.
However, out of an abundance of caution, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases "has continued its partnership with Moderna to evaluate this variant vaccine candidate should there be a need for an updated vaccine".
The variant vaccine candidate differs from the currently authorised Moderna vaccine in that it delivers instructions for making the Sars-CoV-2 spike that incorporates key mutations in the B.1.351 virus variant, according to the NIH.
In addition to the phase one clinical trial, investigators at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases' Vaccine Research Centre are collaborating with Moderna to evaluate mRNA-1273.351 in animal models.
