The government is already collaborating with Moderna to develop vaccine booster shots aimed at strains first identified in South Africa and the United Kingdom.
The Biden administration is rushing to prevent the spread of new strains of the coronavirus that scientists worry could be more transmissible or render vaccines less effective. The government is already collaborating with Moderna to develop vaccine booster shots aimed at strains first identified in South Africa and the United Kingdom. President Joe Biden on Monday also unveiled travel restrictions, implementing new limits for South Africa and reinstating bans for much of Europe that former President Donald Trump had stripped back. The swift federal reaction comes amid new data that suggest some of the Covid-19 variants will spread faster or prove more resistant to vaccines than earlier versions of the virus, prolonging the pandemic and swamping a critical first year for the new president. Biden, who campaigned on quickly reining in the virus, has insisted that doing so is essential to fulfill his broader agenda. But since taking office, he has emphasized the difficulties his team faces and warned of mounting health and logistical challenges. “We’re trying to stay a step ahead of the game, rather than waiting for something to happen and reacting,” Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which is working with Moderna, told POLITICO. A report last week from U.K. government science advisers indicated that the British variant could be deadlier than other versions of the virus. And preliminary research studies suggesting the South African strain could reduce the potency of existing vaccines have added to the urgency. Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine — one of two shots authorized for use in the U.S., along with a Pfizer/BioNTech option — is nearly 95 percent effective against older versions of the coronavirus. But early studies suggest the shot is less potent, though still effective, against a strain first found in South Africa. The company is starting human trials for two different booster shots aimed at those variants “out of an abundance of caution,” CEO Stéphane Bancel said Monday. The variant first spotted in the U.K., meanwhile, does not appear to reduce vaccines’ potency, but officials say it is at least 30 percent more transmissible than other versions. A British government advisory board on Friday also said there is a “realistic possibility” that the strain is more deadly as well. The U.S. government is in constant communication with manufacturers on work to modify vaccines quickly if needed, Fauci said.
