It looks like a vaccine could be coming soon as more and more pharmaceutical companies are ramping up the efforts to stop the spread of coronavirus. Following Pfizer's news of a vaccine that has shown a 90% effectiveness, rival company Moderna has revealed that they, too, have created a vaccine that has an even higher rate of effectiveness.
Moderna says that following preliminary data, they've found that its vaccine is 94.5 percent effective. With both Moderna and Pfizer rushing to bring vaccines to the public, they could be just weeks away from receiving emergency permission for immediate distribution throughout the United States. Moderna's president, Dr. Stephen Hoge, described the vaccine as a "really important milestone."
"That should give us all hope that actually a vaccine is going to be able to stop this pandemic and hopefully get us back to our lives,” Hoge told AP. "It won’t be Moderna alone that solves this problem. It’s going to require many vaccines [to meet global demand]."
However, scientists who haven't been involved in the testing have cautioned that there's still a need for rigid testing for safety before it's publicly administered to Americans.
Nonetheless, the CEO of Pfizer congratulated the rival company on the promising development.
"I am thrilled to hear the good news coming out of @moderna_tx’s #COVID19 vaccine development program. Our companies share a common goal – defeating this dreaded disease – and today we congratulate everyone at Moderna and share in the joy of their encouraging results," Albert Boula tweeted.
The possibility of having two vaccines out by 2021 means that we could finally see a bit of normalcy in our day-to-day lives, slowly but surely. When the pandemic struck, Fauci said that he'd be satisfied if a vaccine came out with a 60% effective rate. Though it might be too early, the signs of a vaccine is looking good.