Pfizer-BioNTech announce positive topline results of pivotal COVID-19 vaccine study in adolescents
Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and BioNTech SE (Nasdaq: BNTX) today announced that, in a Phase 3 trial in adolescents 12 to 15 years of age with or without prior evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection, the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine BNT162b2 demonstrated 100% efficacy and robust antibody responses, exceeding those recorded earlier in vaccinated participants aged 16 to 25 years old, and was well tolerated. 
GSK has reached an agreement in principle with Novavax and the UK Government Vaccines Taskforce to support manufacturing of up to 60 million doses of Novavax' COVID-19 vaccine candidate (NVX-CoV2373) for use in the UK. GSK will provide 'fill and finish' manufacturing capacity at its Barnard Castle facility in the North East of England beginning as early as May 2021, with a rapid technology transfer between the two companies beginning immediately. 
BioNTech SE today announced that the European Medicines Agency (EMA) approved the manufacturing of the COVID-19 vaccine drug product at the facility in Marburg. As part of the process, EMA has approved the production of the drug substance, the mRNA, at the Marburg site over the course of this week. 
Sanofi Pasteur, the vaccines global business unit of Sanofi, and Translate Bio (NASDAQ: TBIO), a clinical-stage messenger RNA (mRNA) therapeutics company, announced the start of the Phase 1/2 clinical trial for MRT5500, an mRNA vaccine candidate against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. 
Today the Medicines Health Regulatory Authority (MHRA) and European Medicines Agency (EMA) reaffirmed the benefits of COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca continue to far outweigh the risks.
Some countries in the European Union have temporarily suspended use of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine as a precautionary measure based on reports of rare blood coagulation disorders in persons who had received the vaccine. Other countries in the EU - having considered the same information - have decided to continue using the vaccine in their immunization programmes.