RNS: World Health Organisation (WHO) has given node for emergency use of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine.
The Moderna COVID‑19 vaccine, codenamed mRNA-1273, is a COVID-19 vaccine (developed by Moderna, the United States National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) based in Cambridge, Massachusetts) adds in the emergency list of the WHO, together with vaccines from AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson.
In a statement, WHO’s CEO Stephane Bancel said, similar approvals for China’s Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines are expected in the coming days and weeks.
The emergency use for Moderna’s vaccine, announced late on 30 April, took many months because of delays that WHO faced in getting data from the manufacturer, it reported.
Notably, The Moderna COVID‑19 vaccine, codenamed mRNA-1273, is a COVID-19 vaccine developed by Moderna, the United States National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). It is designed to be administered as two 0.5 mL doses given by intramuscular injection at an interval of four weeks apart.
It is an RNA vaccine composed of nucleoside-modified mRNA (modRNA) encoding a spike protein of SARS-CoV-2, which is encapsulated in lipid nanoparticles. Along with the Pfizer–BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, it was one of the two main RNA vaccines developed and deployed against COVID-19 in 2020.
On 18 December 2020, mRNA-1273 was issued an Emergency Use Authorization by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA). It was first authorized for use in Canada on 23 December 2020, in Israel on 5 January 2021, in the European Union on 6 January 2021, in the United Kingdom on 8 January 2021, and in Singapore on 3 February 2021.
