While the number of people infected by Kovid-19, which was seen in Wuhan, China, in late 2019, worldwide exceeded 260 million, the number of people who died due to the epidemic exceeded 5.4 million. The Omicron variant of the virus continues to cause a new fear in the world.
On the other hand, the founders of the German BioNTech company, which developed an mRNA vaccine against the corona virus together with the US company Pfizer, Prof. Dr. Uğur Şahin and Dr. Özlem Türeci made statements about the new variant at a conference organized by Reuters.
Uğur Şahin, CEO of the company, said in a statement at the Reuters Next conference that he should be able to adapt the Covid-19 vaccine relatively quickly.
‘VACCINATION PEOPLE CAN ALSO BE INFECTED BUT…’
Şahin said, “We have a large number of mutated variants. We think the Omicron might be able to evade the antibodies. It can infect people who have been vaccinated and people who have had Covid before. This is clear. But it’s not clear if the new variant could cause serious illness in vaccinated people.
It’s also not clear whether vaccinated people can be protected against serious illness. However, we hope that vaccinated people will be protected from serious illness. However, unvaccinated people may face a more serious illness.”
NEW VARIANT ARRIVED EARLIER THAN EXPECTED
The new variant came out earlier than I expected, I didn’t expect it to be found before next year. Currently, we expect real-world results for the new variant to roll out in a few weeks.
We are confident that people who overdose on boosters will be protected against serious illness. We’ll find out in a few weeks.
The most important fact is that our vaccine is at a level to protect against serious disease caused by all variants.
“I THINK WE WILL NEED A NEW VACCINE”
I think we will need a new vaccine against Covid-19. The looming question is when will we need it.
We have ample time to quickly adapt our existing vaccine to the Omicron variant. There is a lot of data waiting to come in right now. We’re trying to figure out how urgent the situation is. The adapted vaccine could be ready next year.
“WE ARE TRYING TO ACCELERATE VACCINE DISTRIBUTION TO POOR COUNTRIES”
We were in Senegal a few weeks ago. We talked to the companies we partner with about the distribution of the vaccine to poor countries. We are working on technologies that will facilitate distribution in poor countries. We aim to finish the construction of our production facilities here by 2022.
We are confident that we will accelerate the distribution of vaccines in these countries with new technologies.
I have no problem sharing the patent of the Corona virus vaccine. Personally, I’m looking for solutions. We train your people. We have been working for 10 years to develop the mRNA vaccine. In order for our production to be of the highest quality, it goes through 50 thousand steps. Our experienced partners in the USA and Europe are working on this. “
We plan to send one billion doses of the vaccine to developing countries by the end of this year, and another billion doses next year.”
CANCER VACCINE EXPLANATION FROM ÖZLEM TÜRECİ
Özlem Türeci, a scientist and one of the founders of BioNTech, said, “One of our biggest goals is to send vaccines to poor countries and rural areas. We try to produce special solutions for poor and developing countries. Our solution efforts include airplanes and drones. Anyone can join our efforts.” Türeci also said, “In addition to Covid-19, cancer is a pandemic that affects the world. We continue to work on our potential cancer vaccine.”