Per ardua ad Astra

27 Nov 2020 By Aimee Donnellan Follow @aimeedonnellan

The $134 bln drug giant may do a new trial of its Covid-19 vaccine to clear up uncertainties over its effectiveness. Even if rivals’ look better, AstraZeneca has a good story to tell. Still, a share price dip this week reflects that overegging results is not where you want to be.

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AstraZeneca is likely to run an additional global trial to assess the efficacy of its Covid-19 vaccine using a lower dosage, its chief executive Pascal Soriot, was quoted as saying on Nov. 26 by Bloomberg.

Instead of adding the trial to an ongoing U.S. process, AstraZeneca might launch a fresh study to evaluate a lower dosage of its vaccine that performed better than a full dosage, Soriot told Bloomberg.

Soriot said he did not expect the additional trial to delay British and European regulatory approvals.

Meanwhile, the British government has asked the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency to assess the AstraZeneca vaccine. The referral is a significant “first step" in getting the vaccine approved, the government said.

A peer-reviewed analysis of data from the new trial will be published in a medical journal in coming weeks.

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Soriot said he did not expect the additional trial to delay British and European regulatory approvals.

A peer-reviewed analysis of data from the new trial will be published in a medical journal in coming weeks.

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