Word size
Courtesy Johnson & Johnson
New data on early stage trials of
Johnson and johnsonOf
Kovid-19 is offering vaccine Experts believe the vaccine will work as they await the results of a large Phase 3 trial to be held in the coming weeks.
Trial data published Wednesday by the New England Journal of Medicine offered an expanded and updated account of the paper posted a week earlier on the so-called preprint server. The paper showed that 90% or more of the participants developed neutralizing antibodies against the virus that caused Kovid-19 within 29 days after injection of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, and remained neutralizing antibodies for 71 days after injection .
Shares of Johnson & Johnson were up 1.8% in prepaid trading on Thursday.
The data helped raise an emerging consensus that the Johnson & Johnson (ticker: JNJ) vaccine phase 3 data, expected later this month, would show that the vaccine is very effective, if not as effective.
Moderna
(MRNA) and
Pfizer
(PFE) vaccines.
But this effectiveness difference may not matter, given the other advantages of Johnson & Johnson, which already has authorization from the Food and Drug Administration.
The Johnson & Johnson vaccine’s chief advisor to the federal government’s Operation Tana Speed, Drs. “The expectation is 80, 85%, or perhaps more, efficacy,” said Monseff Saloi, speaking on a panel.
J. P. MourganOf
Health care conference shortly before the New England Journal paper was posted online.
Modern’s vaccine demonstrated 94.1% efficacy in its Phase 3 trial, while Pizer’s vaccine demonstrated 95% efficacy.
Still, while Modern and Pfizer vaccines were tested in a two-dose diet, Johnson & Johnson was set to report the results of a Phase 3 trial that followed a shot of the vaccine later this month Does the test. Saloi suggested that it is not realistic to imagine that every person who takes the first shot of a Modern or Pfizer vaccine will return for a second shot, and will experience complete protection of those vaccines.
“People need to realize that in real life, a very large percentage of people immunized with the first dose will not receive their second dose for various reasons,” Saloi said.
Saloi said he expected the FDA to authorize the Johnson & Johnson vaccine if it exhibited efficacy of 80% or more. He added that 65% or 70% of the effective vaccine could also be very useful in combating the virus, although it would raise difficult questions about which countries have access to more effective vaccines, and which achieve less-effective.
Analysts said promising new data from Johnson & Johnson raised confidence that the Phase 3 trial results would be solid. Experts are increasingly convinced that Kovid-19 is not going anywhere, the answer may be crucial to Johnson & Johnson’s long-term earnings and its stock price.
“If JNJ’s data show efficacy similar to the PFE … and mRNA … vaccines, then we believe JNJ’s vaccine would have looked at the single-dose regimen in the Dodger Regime, given in a note on Wednesday Hue may proceed. “There is a general consensus that SAR-CoV-2 will be endemic, so we think a leading vaccine may drive upside down for evaluation.”
Apart from the benefit of a single-dose diet over two doses, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is not subject to the extreme storage requirements of Pfizer and Modern vaccines. While Pfizer and its partner BioNTech (BNTX) are working on a powder version of their vaccine, which should be ready in the second half of the year, the extremely cold temperatures required for shipping the vaccine now pose an additional scientific challenge. .
In a note to investors Wednesday night, Jefferies Health Care Trading Desk analyst Jared Holz wrote that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine would likely not need to prove as effective as Pfizer and Modern vaccines to excite investors.
“In fact, we don’t think JNJ has to show up at the 90% + or even higher levels of the 80s, because its simple logistic set-up can serve as a inflection point in a patient’s immunization, which last month. Is transparent. Approval of messenger RNA options, “Holz wrote.” Without reading too much into the data announcement this evening … We believe investors can start taking some money off the table at mRNA and to some extent Till JNJ can PFE in Phase III readout. “
The New York Times reported Wednesday that Johnson & Johnson missed some initial production targets in the vaccine’s manufacturing. But the company says it remains on track to produce hundreds of millions of doses in the first half of the year, and by the end of 2021 is about one billion.
Write Josh Nathan-Kazis at [email protected]
.