Oxford-Astrazeneca COVID-19 vaccine effective against mutant UK variant

The developers of AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine say the shot appears to work against the variant detected in Britain late last year.

It's similar to previously reported results by other vaccine manufacturers, including Pfizer and Moderna. Andrew Pollard of Oxford University, which helped develop the AstraZeneca vaccine, says the shot also appears to reduce the amount of virus in people infected with COVID-19. That could potentially slow the disease's spread. The research hasn't yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Sarah Gilbert of Oxford says it should be straightforward to tweak their vaccine to account for the variant detected in the UK.

She says vaccine manufacturers could quickly insert a new gene sequence from the variant into the virus needed to make the vaccine. Gilbert adds scientists are already in talks with regulatory agencies about how they might quickly authorize any new vaccine. It's a similar process for seasonal flu vaccines.

Also, researchers are studying the potential effectiveness of the vaccine against the variant that arose in South Africa.

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