Johnson & Johnson’s (JNJ) – Get report one-off vaccine candidate has been shown to be safe and produce a meaningful immune response in an early-stage trial, according to a published report on Wednesday.
A single ingestion of the vaccine yields sustainable antibodies, Dr. Paul Stoffels, chief scientific officer at J&J, told CNBC. The results gave the company ‘confidence’ that the vaccine would be effective, Stoffels told CNBC.
The results of phase 1-2 trials are on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine candidate is also undergoing Phase 3 trials to determine its true effectiveness. Results of the study are expected later this month.
If successful and approved, the vaccine will become the third available to combat the COVID-19 pandemic that is still raging out of control in the US and much of the world.
Nearly 400,000 Americans have died from the disease and more than 22 million have been infected.
A vaccine co-developed by Pfizer (PFE) – Get report and BioNTech (BNTX) – Get report received approval for emergency use last month, together with a second vaccine from Moderna (MRNA) – Get report. Both require follow-up shots and are stored at very low temperatures, making it difficult to disperse and roll out the vaccines. The US is very bad behind the predicted vaccination schedules, which called for 20 million vaccinations to be administered by the end of December. Only about 10 million have done so so far.
The Johnson and Johnson vaccine requires only a single shot and can be stored at higher temperatures. However, its implementation is also running behind schedule and will probably only start in earnest in April due to delays in production, assuming it has been cleared for use by the FDA.
Shares of Johnson and Johnson rose 1.08% to $ 159.60 on Wednesday.