Ontario: One of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, which produced several million Covid-19 vaccines, is now working on developing mixed influenza and coronavirus shots.
US regulators have cleared Pfizer and BioNTech for the initial phase and have also asked companies to rapidly develop its single-dose vaccine. Once the vaccine is ready, it will work to protect people from the flu virus as well as the strain of the omicrone variant.
Companies have already started preliminary trials to assess the safety and efficacy of this mixed vaccine on healthy adults.
Pfizer and BioNTech will use mRNA technology to target the BA·4 and BA·5 omicron variants as well as the four flu viruses. These omicron variants and four flu viruses have been identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) this year as the main strains. If this experiment is successful, it will be the first attempt to prevent two respiratory diseases with one dose.
Pfizer is already working on a modified influenza vaccine. In September, the pharmaceutical company announced trials on 25,000 people in the US. If this trial is successful, then according to Pfizer, this flu shot can be ready by 2024. Moderna is also working on this aspect.