The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the Covid-19 vaccine by the biotechnology company Novavax for use in teenagers between the ages of 12 and 17 in an emergency setting. It is the fourth coronavirus vaccine to be made accessible in the United States, and it makes use of protein-based technologies in contrast to the other three.
In contrast to mRNA vaccines, protein-based vaccinations take a more conventional approach, instructing the immune system to recognise tiny modified fragments of the virus that the vaccine is targeting. That refers to pieces of the coronavirus spike protein in this instance. The original coronavirus strain’s genetic sequence served as the basis for the vaccination.
Overall, the vaccine’s clinical effectiveness in this age range is about 80%. In adults, the vaccine has a 90% overall effectiveness rate. The Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5, among others, had a “broad” immunological response to the vaccination, according to a Novavax announcement from the beginning of July.
In the U.S. government’s race to create a Covid vaccine in 2020, Novavax was one of the original competitors and received $1.8 billion in taxpayer financing from Operation Warp Speed. The small Maryland biotech startup, however, struggled to set up manufacturing fast, and its clinical trial results were read out much later than those of competitors Pfizer or Moderna.
