Brussels authorizes the use of the Moderna vaccine in the EU

The European Commission (EC) granted this Wednesday, January 6th, a conditional license to Moderna for the use in European countries of its covid-19 vaccine, only a few hours after the European Medicines Agency (EMA) has endorsed the drug.

"We have authorized Moderna's vaccine, the second vaccine approved in the EU," European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wrote on Twitter.

In a statement, the EU executive said that, based on the positive opinion of the EMA, it has verified "all the elements that support the market authorization" and has consulted the Member States before granting the "conditional marketing authorization".

Such a conditional licence is an authorisation that is based on less data than is required for a normal marketing authorisation, but is used if it is considered that "the benefit of the immediate availability of a medicinal product clearly outweighs the risk linked to the fact that not all the information is available".

Moderna should continue to provide information to the EMA from studies it is already conducting or from new trials to confirm that the benefits still outweigh the risks.

This vaccine is administered in two injections in the arm, 28 days apart, and the most common side effects that were detected were generally mild or moderate, and they improved a few days after the vaccination, the EMA assures.

The European Commission had signed a contract with Moderna that will allow the distribution of up to 160 million doses of its vaccine between the first and third quarters of this year, which will be added to those of BioNTech and Pfizer, already authorized by Brussels at the end of December.

This means a total of 460 million doses already approved for commercialization, a figure that could increase if the EMA approves the prophylactics from other laboratories with which the European Commission has signed purchase contracts in recent months, such as Sanofi-GSK, Johnson and Johnson, AstraZeneca, Curevac.

"Member States have to ensure that the pace of vaccinations is up to date," emphasized the European Commissioner for Health, Stella Kyriakides, in a statement after several European countries, including Spain, have started the immunization campaign at a slower pace than expected.
 

The United Kingdom registers 1,041 deaths from covid in the last 24 hours

The United Kingdom registered in the last 24 hours 1,041 new deaths by covid-19, after surpassing the thousand of daily deaths by the virus for the first time since last April, according to official data released this Wednesday.

The British Ministry of Health also reported another record number of coronavirus infections, with 62,322 new infections reported, representing the highest number of daily positives since the beginning of the pandemic. This updated data brings the total number of deaths from the disease to 77,346 in the United Kingdom.

Prior to the release of these figures, which also show that the country as a whole has detected 2,836,801 cases to date, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson warned Parliament that the severe restrictions associated with the new confinement in England could remain in place until the end of March.

In a statement read before the House of Commons, the Conservative leader said that the eventual deconfinement in the country will be "gradual. Johnson also noted that the "fundamental difference" from the current national lockdown is that the country now has a covid-19 vaccination program.

The intensification of controls in England includes ordering citizens to stay home and closing schools in the face of an alarming upsurge in infections from the new, much more transmissible strain. The government plans to carry out an "ongoing review" of the measures, which will be monitored every two weeks, and there will be a legal obligation to lift them when they are no longer necessary.

According to the latest data, one out of every 50 people (about 1.1 million citizens) in private homes in the English region, the most populated in the country with 56 of the 66.6 million inhabitants, was infected with the covid last week. In addition, 1.3 million people have been vaccinated against covid-19 in the United Kingdom, 1.1 million in England.