Pharma giant Pfizer on Wednesday boosted hopes of a possible end to the coronavirus pandemic by announcing improved results for its vaccine, even as the death rate in Europe surged and protests against restrictions turned violent.
Pfizer said a completed study of its experimental COVID-19 vaccine showed it was 95 per cent effective, offering relief in parts of the world struggling to cope with a second wave.
“With hundreds of thousands of people around the globe infected every day, we urgently need to get a safe and effective vaccine to the world,” Pfizer’s chief executive Albert Bourla said.
The announcement came after another US firm involved in the vaccine race, Moderna, said this week that its own candidate was 94.5 per cent effective, while Russia has also announced a vaccine it claims is more than 90 per cent effective.
Stock markets mostly rose after the news from Pfizer but optimism was tempered by concern that US lawmakers are not doing enough to agree on a new much-needed stimulus for the world’s top economy.
The EU is also struggling to adopt its 1.8-trillion-euro budget and coronavirus recovery plan, with Poland and Hungary vetoing approval ahead of a summit on Thursday.
Deaths rise 18 per cent
Europe remains the hardest-hit region, accounting for 46 per cent of new global cases and 49 per cent of deaths last week, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
While infection rates in Europe have slowed, the WHO on Wednesday said the death rate went up by 18 per cent last week from the previous week.
The figures showed the only region where cases and deaths declined last week was Southeast Asia.
Worldwide, more than 1.3 million people have died of COVID-19 and over 55 million have been infected with the virus since it first surfaced in China late last year, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP.
In Switzerland, one of the worst-hit countries in Europe, a medical association has warned that intensive care units are becoming saturated.
“Swiss intensive care units are at the limit of their regular bed capacity,” the Swiss Society for Intensive Care Medicine (SSMI) said.
It said the 876 ICU beds for adults that it certifies across the wealthy Alpine nation “are practically all full”.
More beds have meanwhile been added, and the Swiss military has been called in to support efforts in several cantons.-AFP
