At least 4 drugmakers expect their vaccines will be against new coronavirus variant

At least four drugmakers expect their COVID-19 vaccines will be effective against the new fast-spreading variant of the virus that is raging in Britain and are performing tests that should provide confirmation in a few weeks, Reuters reported.

Ugur Sahin, chief executive of Germany’s BioNTech , which with partner Pfizer Inc, took less than a year to get a vaccine approved, said on Tuesday he expects its messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine to still work well.

Moderna Inc, Germany’s CureVac and British drugmaker AstraZeneca Plc also believe their shots will work against the new threat that has sown chaos in Britain, prompting a wave of travel bans that are disrupting trade with Europe and threatening to further isolate the island country.

“Scientifically it is highly likely that the immune response by this vaccine can also deal with this virus variant,” he said in the Reuters report.

Sahin said it will take another two weeks or so of study and data collection to get a definitive answer.

“The vaccine contains more than 1,270 amino acids, and only nine of them are changed (in the mutated virus). That means that 99% of the protein is still the same.”

The mutation known as the B.1.1.7 lineage may be up to 70% more infectious and more of a concern for children.