EU regulator clears tweaked versions of Covid vaccines

Vials of Covid-19 vaccine (Pfizer via AP)

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has recommended the authorisation of two coronavirus vaccines made by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna which have been tweaked to include protection against an early version of the Omicron variant.

The EU drugs regulator said in a statement that the two messenger RNA boosters offered protection both against the original version of Covid-19 and the Omicron subvariant BA.1, which has since been overtaken globally by later Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5.