The Omicron variant, which is the majority to date, is resistant to current vaccines. Vaccine producers want to neutralize it.
“Vaccine reduces risk of infection by 85%, including Omicron”, said Olivier Véran during debates on the vaccine pass. However, this variant is less sensitive to the vaccine than the Delta variant, he also admitted. The Pfizer and Moderna laboratories therefore already have the solution: a vaccine suitable for Omicron, whose production has already started, says Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla on the American financial channel CNBC: “I don’t know if we will need it, I don’t know if or how it will be used, but we will be ready. The factory has already started production”. For his part, the general manager of Moderna, Stéphane Bancel indicated that a vaccine against this variant would be ready for the fall: “We have to be careful to try to stay one step ahead of the virus, not to stay behind it”, he stressed.
Variants as the life cycle of the virus
The variants of the coronavirus follow one another. Indeed, it is part of the life of the virus, which mutates to adapt to the immunity acquired by the population. We can hope that the mutations go to less serious forms, as is the case between Delta and Omicron. This is explained by Dr. Martin Blachier, questioned by aufeminin: “We think that as the selection (of the forms of mutations by the virus, editor’s note) will be done by immune escape, this will be synonymous with less virulence. Then, when we look at the flu, the recirculation mechanism allows more severe versions than others, so you have to take the theory with care “.