Munich (dpa / lby) - The expected EU approval of the two adapted corona vaccines comes too late from the point of view of the Munich infectiologist Clemens Wendtner. In the "Augsburger Allgemeine" (Friday) he pointed out that the omicron subline BA.1, against which the new agents are supposed to protect particularly well, no longer plays a role in Germany. "You can see with the naked eye that the new vaccine is coming too late." Wendtner added that it is slowly leaking out to many that the vaccine does not fully do what is suggested. The preparations were also effective to a certain extent against the currently predominant sub-lines BA.4 and BA.5 - but the previous preparation had already done so.
The European Medicines Agency EMA cleared the way for the two adapted vaccines on Thursday. The EU Commission still has to formally decide on the approval. The EMA decision affects applications from Biontech/Pfizer and the US company Moderna for approval of so-called bivalent mRNA vaccines, which are intended to protect against the original Sars-CoV-2 and the omicron subline BA.1.
Subject to the expected EU-wide approval, around 14 million doses from Biontech/Pfizer and Moderna, which are adapted to the BA.1 variant, are to come to Germany in the two weeks starting September 5th. This emerges from a letter from Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD).
