With the United States battling another surge in Covid-19 cases and the nation seeing another 2,32,255 fresh coronavirus cases on Wednesday, the country is on the path to approve a second coronavirus vaccine after it began the rollout of Pfizer vaccine last week.

US regulators are now weighing in whether to grant emergency use authorisation for the coronavirus vaccine developed by Moderna Inc, just a week after an earlier vaccine from Pfizer Inc and German partner BioNTech SE won approved for mass distribution.

A panel of outside advisers to the US Food and Drug Administration overwhelmingly endorsed Moderna's vaccine candidate for emergency use after a daylong meeting on Thursday.

2 doses of Oxford vaccine show response
Early data from the trials of the coronavirus vaccine candidate being developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca show two full doses of the vaccine give better immune response than the previously tried one full dose and a half-dose booster.

Developers of the vaccine candidate have already published late-stage trial results showing higher efficacy when a half dose is followed by a full dose, compared to a two full-dose regime.

Story Credit: https://www.indiatoday.in/coronavirus-outbreak/story/vaccine-update-us-may-approve-moderna-aiims-covaxin-trials-1750644-2020-12-18