Moderna is a step closer to showing detractors that it is no moonshot stock. The biotech group on Monday said its experimental Covid-19 vaccine was 94.5 per cent effective, according to preliminary data. That makes it the second US company, after Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, to report positive results from late-stage clinical trials.
This is great news for public health. Light is glimmering at the end of the lockdown tunnel following months of grim pandemic headlines.
The preliminary data also brings vindication for one of the sector’s most divisive companies. Established in 2010, Moderna has never brought a product to market. Yet that did not stop the group from raising $604.3m at a $7.5bn valuation in a record-setting IPO back in December 2018.