Moderna announced on 13th April that their coronavirus vaccine was 90 per cent effective six months after a person receives their second dose.

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The company in a statement said that new results from a preclinical study of the company's COVID-19 variant-specific vaccine candidates showed that the company's variant-specific booster vaccine candidates (mRNA-1273.351 and mRNA-1273.211) increase neutralizing titers against SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern.

To date, the company has delivered approximately 132 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine globally. "Vaccine efficacy starting two weeks following the second dose and based on the updated adjudicated cases remains consistent with prior updates, including greater than 90% against all cases of COVID-19, and greater than 95% against severe cases of COVID-19," the company said in its statement.

According to The Hill, Moderna is working for its vaccine to be fully approved by the U.S. as it is only under emergency authorizations from the Food and Drug Administration. "The Moderna team continues to make important progress with our COVID-19 vaccine. We are looking forward to having the clinical data from our variant-specific booster candidates, as well as clinical data from the Phase 2/3 study of our COVID-19 Vaccine in adolescents", said Stephane Bancel, Chief Executive Officer of Moderna in a statement.

The CEO added: "The new preclinical data on our variant-specific vaccine candidates give us confidence that we can proactively address emerging variants. Moderna will make as many updates to our COVID-19 vaccine as necessary until the pandemic is under control". The study includes data from 900 coronavirus cases with over 100 of the cases being severe. Along with the updated efficacy of the vaccine, Moderna is currently working on its second phase for testing in adolescents, as reported by The Hill.

According to the news outlet, there are around 3,000 minors ages 12 to 17 fully enrolled in Moderna's trial and the company is working on enrolling children from 6 months to 11 years old.