Sorrento Therapeutics Inc (SRNE)

[dia76ca]

Why is COVI-SHIELD needed? This is from today's Business Insider:
"COVID-19 vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech appear significantly less effective against the coronavirus variant first found in South Africa, a lab study has suggested.

The percentage of protective antibodies that neutralized the variant - called B.1.351, which has been recorded in 20 US states - was 12.4 times lower for Moderna's COVID-19 shot than against the original coronavirus, and 10.3 times lower for Pfizer's, the study authors said.

This was a bigger drop than in previous lab studies testing the vaccines against manufactured forms of the variant, they said. For this study, the researchers used real forms of the variant taken from people who had caught the virus."