Moderna Inc said on Wednesday it expects that the immunity induced by its COVID-19 vaccine would be protective against the coronavirus variants reported in the UK.
The company said it plans to run tests to confirm the vaccine's activity against any strain.
Moderna's comments came amid the British government's plan to place huge swathes of England under its strictest COVID-19 restrictions as a highly infectious virus variant sweeps the country.
The company said it expects its vaccine, which was recently granted the U.S. emergency use authorization, to be protective against the UK variant based on data to date.
"We have already tested sera from animals and humans vaccinated with the Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine against a number of previous variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that have emerged since the first outbreak of the pandemic and found our vaccine to remain equally effective," Moderna said.
The U.S.-based company said it would be performing additional tests of the vaccine in the coming weeks to confirm its expectation.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
From FLiRT To FLuQE: What To Know About The Latest Covid Variants Covid Still Kills 1,700 A Week Around World: WHO Vaccine Trial Patient In US Sues AstraZeneca, Claiming She Was Left "Permanently Disabled" Indian-Origin Family, On Way To Daughter's College, Killed In US Car Crash Woman Doctor Assaulted By Drunk Patient, His Relatives At Mumbai Hospital BJP Leader, 2 Doctors Summoned Over 'Fake News' On Kolkata Rape-Murder Questions That CBI Asked RG Kar Hospital Ex-Principal Over Kolkata Horror Imane Khelif, And The Scourge Of 'Transvestigators' Singer Bebe Rexha Claims She Was Banned From A Flight For Speaking Albanian Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.