Exceedingly Good News! Moderna's mRNA Vaccine Also Over 90% Effective: Preliminary Data

Sure, it is "early look" data, but we continue to think Moderna may actually file with the FDA within days, and thus get FDA approvals a bit ahead of Pfizer. But to be sure, both companies will sell every dose they can produce. And there will be room for multiple others.

Overall this is very good news, and the stock, which could be had at around $35 early this Spring. . . is now pre-market trading at over $100. Nice -- and the reality is (despite 1600 Penn's wilder statements), the dosing of the public is not likely before mid-March 2021.

And, in what may turn out to be the most important advantage for Moderna -- its vaccine is stable, and may be stored at "regular" freezer temperatures (-2 degrees F) for up to 30 days, while the Pfizer candidate needs near liquid nitrogen temps storage and transport logistics, which only major metropolitan hospitals are equipped to support. All of which means the Moderna vaccine may be trucked into very remote areas, with just a regular refrigerator truck. That will make a very important difference in how accessible this is, for the rural US, and the rest of (less infrastructure developed) world. Yes, extremely good news, per the UK's The Guardian:

. . . .Peter Openshaw, professor of experimental medicine at Imperial College, London, said the Moderna results were “tremendously exciting” and boosted optimism that a choice of good Covid vaccines would be available in the next few months.

He said the inclusion of high-risk and elderly people in the Moderna trial suggested the vaccine would protect those most vulnerable to the disease, while the reported side effects were “what we would expect with a vaccine that is working and inducing a good immune response”.

“Moderna have also announced that the vaccine can be kept in a conventional freezer at -20C for up to 6 months, and that once thawed the vaccine can be kept for up to 30 days at standard refrigerator temperatures of 2 to 8C. This makes the vaccine much easier to deliver,” he said.

“This announcement adds to the general feeling of optimism about vaccines for Covid-19. What we still don’t know is how long any protective immunity may last. For that, we will need to wait,” he added. . . .

I am feeling pretty sanguine about a next holiday season (2021) that might be relatively normal -- at least mostly like "the before times". Smile. . . still a lot of travel, between and through the dark, tangled woods, to be sure -- but. . . better.

[Trivial footnotes department: BTW, Moderna was picked by Martin Shkreli, as one of his top shorts, in mid-2019. And that too is grin-worthy -- as I repeatedly called it a great long term holding, over the prior three years.]

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