Other than Biden, who recommends being careful but not being afraid of omicron. Other than the WHO, the World Health Organization is too soft on Beijing. Other than the EMA, the European Medicines Agency, according to which current vaccines will continue to provide protection pending specific drugs. Words that leave the time they find: the market only believes Stéphane Bancel, the French biologist who emigrated to the US to develop Moderna, the company which, simultaneously with Pfizer-Biontech, developed the vaccine on the MRNA research strain. And if he, as he did this morning, warns that it could take months to have vaccines capable of eradicating the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, the Bull returns to the stable waiting for more favorable times: from Piazza Affari in Frankfurt to Wall Street futures sales are raining again, oil drops and gold goes back to 1.800 dollars.
Few others in the world today enjoy as much credibility as Bancel. When this morning hers appeared interview with the Financial Times most European and Wall Street operators have canceled their purchase orders. “The effectiveness of the vaccine against the Omicron variant - he said - is not the same as against Delta. I don't know how long it will take to have reliable data, but all the scientists I spoke to say the same thing: the outlook is not good." That is, it will take time to find a remedy that shields the 32 mutations of the variant, "so complex that according to experts it would not have appeared before a year or two". Fortunately, it won't take much time to react: in a couple of weeks, the scientist assures, Moderna and Pfizer will be able to develop a discovery capable of dealing with the latest scourge. But it will be only the beginning. “It will take months to produce an Omicron vaccine on a large scale; Neither we nor Pfizer are able to procure a billion doses by next week ”. But by the summer? "Safe". In 2022, the scientist guarantees, Moderna will produce 2-3 billion doses. “It would be silly, however, to focus on a single vaccine when other variants are in circulation”.
Blancel's words accompany the markets drop. While waiting for Wall Street, Europe's stock exchanges worsen along the way, penalized by the scientist's alarm: the EuroStoxx 50 loses 1,8%. Dax -1,6%, Milan goes down to -1,9%, on the lowest since the beginning of October. at the end of the morning, however, the indices improve while remaining in the red at around -1 per cent, depending on the Squares. Few others in the world enjoy as much credibility and esteem as the French scientist. Among these figure Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer, Greek naturalized in the USA just as the spouses Ugur Sahin and Ozlem Tureci, the Biontech researchers who were the first to develop the vaccine thanks to funding from Pfizer, have a German passport today.
Deserved fame if, as it seems, Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have so far saved the lives of half a million people. But also well remunerated because this year the pharma giant will record a turnover of 80 billion dollars, including 29 billion already booked for vaccines. Too bad that, so far, the poorest countries have barely been touched. Does the Omicron variant taste like revenge against the selfishness of the rich? "It's not our fault - defends Barcel - By contract we deliver 60% of the production to the US government, they decide what to do". And there is no shortage of waste. “At least 70 million doses destined for Africa lie in warehouses, stopped because the documents are missing or it is not known how to store the incoming goods”. Maybe, but Fatima Hassan, assistant to the South African government, replies: “A private company cannot have so much power. We need open contracts”. But in the meantime the stock market goes down. But Moderna shares rise by 12%.
