LONDON: The UK’s drug regulator said on Monday it had approved an updated Moderna vaccine against Covid-19 that targets the Omicron variant as well as the original form of the virus.

The Medicine and Healt­hcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said in a statement said it had approved the vaccine for adult booster doses “after it was found to meet the UK regulator’s standards of safety, quality and effectiveness”. It was the first such “bivalent” Covid-19 vaccine to be approved by the British regulator.

The MHRA’s chief executive June Raine said data from a clinical trial had shown it prompted a “strong immune response” against the original virus and Omicron and would provide a “sharpened tool in our armoury” as the virus kept evolving.

Moderna’s CEO Stephane Bancel said in a statement that the US biotech company was “delighted” by the decision, “the first autho­ri­zation of an Omicron-containing bivalent vaccine”.

While vaccines have helped lower hospitalisations and deaths from Covid, which first emerged in China in late 2019, the current jabs are mainly aimed at the earlier strains of the disease.

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2022