U.K.-based pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca and England’s University of Oxford announced Monday that late-stage trials show their COVID-19 vaccine was up to 90% effective in preventing the disease. The determination comes from an interim analysis of their phase 3 trials in the U.K. and in Brazil, which involved two different dosing regimens. One regimen demonstrated 90% efficacy when the vaccine was given as a half dose, followed by a full dose at least a month later. A second regimen showed 62% efficacy when the vaccine was administered as two full doses at least one month apart. The combined analysis from both dosing regimens showed an average efficacy of 70%, according to AstraZeneca and Oxford.
There were a total of 131 COVID-19 cases in the analysis, with no hospitalizations or severe cases of the disease reported in participants receiving the vaccine candidate, according to the statement from Oxford-Astra Zeneca. The team was an early COVID-19 vaccine development frontrunner but it has since been outpaced by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech, both of which announced their phase 3 trial results in the last two weeks, with planned widespread distribution in the coming months, pending FDA emergency use authorization.
Astra Zeneca and Oxford declare their COVID-19 vaccine is up to 90% effective
