Moderna Closes 18B-dollar Worth Of Agreements For COVID-19 Vaccine

Moderna Inc., an American pharmaceutical and biotechnology company, has already closed a billion-dollar worth of agreements for the COVID-19 vaccine that it is producing.

The firm revealed in a fourth-quarter earnings statement that its vaccine pacts with other countries had reached the amount of 18.4 billion dollars.

The Moderna vaccine is one of the most in-demand COVID-19 vaccines in the world because of its near 95 percent efficacy rate. It is recommended for people aged 18 years and older.

For the fourth quarter of 2020, the said pharmaceutical firm earned 571 million dollars, with around 200 million attributed to vaccine sales. By 2021, the company is aiming to produce 1 billion doses of vaccine to be distributed to other countries.

Moderna's closest rival, Pfizer Inc., is projected to earn 15 billion dollars in 2021 for its vaccine. This information was reported by Bloomberg on its official website.

Meanwhile, Moderna is facing a tough problem since its chief medical officer will already be leaving in September. Various reports say that Tal Zaks played a key role in the development of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine. The company is doing its best to find a replacement for Zaks. The person must have "global and commercial experience" to qualify.

"Moderna has been changed in a profound way. Tal joined us when we were a clinical company, and now we have our own authorized product," Stephane Bancel, Moderna's chief executive officer, quipped.

As of now, Moderna is studying possible approaches to vaccine booster shots in the hope of protecting people against the emerging variants of the novel coronavirus. It said a few weeks ago that it had completed producing doses of a new version of its COVID-19 vaccine that will target the South Africa strain.

Moderna also disclosed that it is planning to evaluate if the two versions of COVID-19 vaccines can be combined for those who have yet to undergo vaccination.