Johnson & Johnson vaccine seeks for emergency clearance of the vaccine
Johnson & Johnson applied to the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday for emergency use authorization for its experimental Covid-19 vaccine. The FDA could grant the authorisation within weeks.The agency has scheduled a meeting with its outside advisory panel, which will vote on whether the F.D.A. should authorise the vaccine on Feb 26.
The Johnson & Johnson vaccine, made in partnership with Janssen Pharmaceuticals, requires only basic refrigeration and is given as a single dose. Other vaccines, including Pfizer/BioNTech’s and Moderna’s, as well as vaccines being studied by AstraZeneca and Novavax, require two doses.
J&J announced at the end of last week the first results of its clinical trials, carried out on nearly 44,000 people in eight countries.The vaccine was overall 66 % effective. And it is 85 percent effective in preventing severe forms of the disease.
But these results also raised a concern, the shot was more effective in the United States (72 %), than in South Africa (57 %), where a variant that had appeared in the country has now became dominant.
