AstraZeneca says COVID-19 vaccine found 79 percent effective in US trial

AstraZeneca announced on Monday that its vaccine was 79 percent effective in preventing symptomatic COVID-19 in phase three U.S. testing with no safety concerns found.

The company said in a statement that the vaccine, developed in partnership with Oxford University, was also found to be 100 percent effective in preventing serious cases of the disease and hospitalizations.

AstraZeneca said it will submit the findings to the Food and Drug Administration in a bid for emergency use authorization in the U.S.

The two-shot regimen is already being used in many countries, but federal regulators have been waiting for the results from U.S. clinical trials. Authorization by the FDA could send a strong signal to the world about the quality of the shot, as worldwide confidence has taken a beating recently.

Optimism: The announcement was met with cautious optimism by experts, because an earlier analysis of four separate studies of the vaccine found it to only be about 60 percent effective. But the results were announced in a press release, and full data have not been published. The shot is not likely to be authorized in the U.S. until May, based on past experience with the other three vaccines already on the market.

Global considerations: The shot can be stored easily at normal refrigerator temperatures. It’s relatively cheap, as the company has vowed not to sell it for profit. More importantly, it could give the U.S. a surplus of supply, and is likely to heighten the pressure over sending excess supply to countries in need. The U.S. government ordered 300 million doses of AstraZeneca’s shot, at a cost of more than $1 billion.