Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Moderna CEO: 'Game-Changer' Vaccine Is Easier To Ship
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney, along
- 0:04Speaker 1: with my co host of Bonnie Quinn. Every business day
- 0:06Speaker 1: we bring you interviews from CEOs, market pros, and Bloomberg experts,
- 0:10Speaker 1: along with essential market moving news kind the Bloomberg Markets
- 0:13Speaker 1: Podcast on Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts,
- 0:17Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com. Optimism in the market today,
- 0:21Speaker 1: though a little more temper than when the Fiser vaccine
- 0:24Speaker 1: news came out, I would say, Paul, Yeah, it's been
- 0:26Speaker 1: just an extraordinary hair so on the back of the
- 0:28Speaker 1: Fiser news, Um, it just gives people some hope that
- 0:31Speaker 1: there's some vaccines. Exactly what we're speaking of, of of course,
- 0:36Speaker 1: is this new Maderna news arriving as the US passes
- 0:39Speaker 1: eleven million coronavirus cases. We're going to be speaking with
- 0:43Speaker 1: Sam Fuselli in a little bit to give us the
- 0:45Speaker 1: context on exactly what this Maderna vaccine is. But first
- 0:49Speaker 1: we actually have the man responsible for the Maderna vaccine.
- 0:52Speaker 1: He is the chief executive officer of Modernist I found
- 0:55Speaker 1: at bon Sell and he is joining our television colleagues
- 0:58Speaker 1: Alex Steel and Guy Johnson. So let's toss it over
- 1:01Speaker 1: to Alex So now we welcome our TV viewers and
- 1:05Speaker 1: radio listeners to Stefan Vancell Maderna CEO. Stefan, it's been
- 1:10Speaker 1: a big morning. Congratulations. Were obviously all very excited at
- 1:13Speaker 1: any new prospect of a vaccine. The biggest question though,
- 1:17Speaker 1: that it seems like people have is why does your
- 1:20Speaker 1: vaccine require less cold storage than fives are key to distribution? Yes,
- 1:27Speaker 1: good morning, and thank you for me. I think it
- 1:29Speaker 1: goes back to the fact that we have been working
- 1:32Speaker 1: on Emmony vaccines for more than five years. This is
- 1:36Speaker 1: the tenth vaccine that we have been running a clinical
- 1:40Speaker 1: trial on the over vaccine that you mentioned. It's the
- 1:43Speaker 1: first time that they are doing need fictions is vaccine,
- 1:47Speaker 1: and so over years we've been invested heavily in science,
- 1:51Speaker 1: in process development that allows us now to have a
- 1:54Speaker 1: much better storage condition than what we used to have
- 1:58Speaker 1: five years ago. Stefan, this is really important because it's
- 2:02Speaker 1: going to have a huge impact on distribution. How much
- 2:05Speaker 1: of an effect will that stability at the higher temperature
- 2:08Speaker 1: have and everybody's ability to be able to get hold
- 2:11Speaker 1: of this vaccine. I think it's a huge impact. Were
- 2:16Speaker 1: gonna have a vaccine started minus twenty between our factory
- 2:20Speaker 1: and the big distribution centers, and those are able to
- 2:25Speaker 1: handle that type of product because they're already product approved
- 2:29Speaker 1: by the e M e A in Europe, amature in
- 2:31Speaker 1: the UK, or d in the US at minus twenty celsius.
- 2:35Speaker 1: But what is very important with today's news is we
- 2:38Speaker 1: can now for to thirty days have a vaccine stared
- 2:41Speaker 1: in the regular fridge at two to eight celsius like
- 2:44Speaker 1: you do insulin. And as you know, every pharmacy, uh
- 2:49Speaker 1: you know, doctor's office, hospital has that capability. So we
- 2:53Speaker 1: think it's a very important game changer. The VPS two.
- 2:56Speaker 1: To keep in mind this a vaccine does not require dilution,
- 3:00Speaker 1: and uh the over vaccine that you mentioned requires dilution
- 3:04Speaker 1: at the site. So you take the vaccine out, they
- 3:06Speaker 1: need to dialute it. It's an extra step. What we
- 3:09Speaker 1: have to do to get the world back to normal
- 3:11Speaker 1: is a massive vaccination campaign that never really happened before.
- 3:16Speaker 1: And so every time we're going to be wasting doing
- 3:19Speaker 1: this type of things for the product is going to
- 3:21Speaker 1: be an issue. And so we think that between the
- 3:23Speaker 1: fridge condition storage and the fact that we do not
- 3:27Speaker 1: require any dilution on site. That's gonna be a big
- 3:30Speaker 1: advantage for nurses and doctors to be able to provide
- 3:34Speaker 1: those vaccines quickly to the population. We wants it such
- 3:37Speaker 1: a good distinction. Um, have you had conversations with the
- 3:40Speaker 1: current administration or the incoming Biden administration about kind of distribution,
- 3:43Speaker 1: how to mobilize. Yes. So the operational web Speed has
- 3:49Speaker 1: been working in the US very closely with the CDC
- 3:52Speaker 1: for a long time and we're in daily discussions with them.
- 3:56Speaker 1: What we're gonna do as soon as we got prov
- 4:00Speaker 1: all or a new way by the us FD is
- 4:03Speaker 1: to ship the product via mckenson with the US government
- 4:07Speaker 1: as selected, because we are very active in the seasonal
- 4:10Speaker 1: flu process to get the vaccines out to hospital and pharmacies.
- 4:16Speaker 1: As I'm sure you read CVS Walgreen right and all
- 4:19Speaker 1: the big pharmacy changed in the US have signed up
- 4:22Speaker 1: to get the vaccine from mckinsson to provide administration in
- 4:27Speaker 1: the pharmacies. This is also going to be available you
- 4:29Speaker 1: know in hospitals in some rural area, in community hospitals
- 4:34Speaker 1: or GPS office. So there's a lot of work going
- 4:38Speaker 1: on and this is actually the government taking care of
- 4:41Speaker 1: that step, whereas you know, the military is being involved
- 4:44Speaker 1: to help with logistics stefan um. One of the key
- 4:51Speaker 1: questions as we all watch the case count climbing around
- 4:54Speaker 1: the world is what impact will these shots have on transmission?
- 4:58Speaker 1: So what affects if I have to say my arm,
- 5:01Speaker 1: will this have on my ability if I come into
- 5:04Speaker 1: contact to get the virus to transmit it to others? Yes,
- 5:09Speaker 1: and this we don't know yet. What we know from
- 5:11Speaker 1: today's data is that if you get on vaccine, you're
- 5:15Speaker 1: gonna have a ninety four percent chance to have no
- 5:18Speaker 1: COVID disease. That's obviously a big deal. But what is
- 5:21Speaker 1: even more important in my opinion, is of the nine
- 5:25Speaker 1: case of disease that were analyzed yesterday by the independent
- 5:30Speaker 1: n I actually lead safety board was severe cases, which
- 5:35Speaker 1: was the secondary endpoint of that phase free study. So
- 5:39Speaker 1: eleven of the ninety cases were severe. But what is
- 5:43Speaker 1: really remarkable is that of those eleven cases eleven where
- 5:48Speaker 1: with people who got placebo. There were no case reported
- 5:53Speaker 1: of people who get the model of vaccine. So when
- 5:55Speaker 1: you put those two data together, what does it tell
- 5:57Speaker 1: you with the data we have to there, it's seems
- 6:00Speaker 1: that are vaccine. If you get it, you're very high
- 6:02Speaker 1: chance of being with no disease, and if you get diseased,
- 6:06Speaker 1: most probably you will get mild disease. And if you
- 6:08Speaker 1: think about the impact on hospitalization, I see you, and
- 6:12Speaker 1: the impact on the economy where governments around the world
- 6:15Speaker 1: are trying to slow down contacts because they want to
- 6:19Speaker 1: manage the limited hospital and I see capacity. So if
- 6:23Speaker 1: that problem was to go away by having a vaccine
- 6:26Speaker 1: that prevents severe disease like ours seem to do, that's
- 6:30Speaker 1: a game changer. To your question about transmission. We will
- 6:34Speaker 1: know soon. As part of our study, we're also looking
- 6:37Speaker 1: at measuring antibodies that come from the virus but could
- 6:41Speaker 1: not come from the vaccine, and so when we have
- 6:44Speaker 1: that data will of course share it. It is possible
- 6:47Speaker 1: that the vaccine will prevent infection. We have shown that
- 6:50Speaker 1: in non human primates, in monkeys, but we need of
- 6:54Speaker 1: course to puttin human now just in a bit more time.
- 6:57Speaker 1: But the most important thing is to prevent disease. Is
- 7:00Speaker 1: if people vaccinated will not have disease, we will be
- 7:03Speaker 1: in a very different world. What's the breakdown for the
- 7:06Speaker 1: German population versus older people? Say those over sixty five,
- 7:10Speaker 1: you have fifteen in a trial, right, So what was
- 7:13Speaker 1: plasibo which were vaccinated? What was the effect? Yeah, we
- 7:18Speaker 1: don't know all the details yet because remember the company
- 7:21Speaker 1: is blind dead, the data is owned and run by
- 7:24Speaker 1: the independent Safety Bomb. But what we know is that
- 7:28Speaker 1: we had only five active cases on on the drug
- 7:32Speaker 1: and so we anticipate a good response in the elderly.
- 7:36Speaker 1: We will know more in a couple of weeks when
- 7:38Speaker 1: we have the study finalized and file to be f
- 7:41Speaker 1: D and in the MHI in the UK. But if
- 7:45Speaker 1: you look at the phase one data which were published
- 7:47Speaker 1: in the New England, were actually the vaccine of all
- 7:50Speaker 1: the vaccines in the clinic that was able to sustain
- 7:53Speaker 1: from the twenty five year old to a seventy year
- 7:56Speaker 1: old the same level of antibody for all of a
- 7:59Speaker 1: participants in the study. So we are costly optimistic that
- 8:02Speaker 1: in the elderly and other people with high commobility factor
- 8:06Speaker 1: we should have an effective vaccine. Stephan, I'm Christina guard
- 8:11Speaker 1: the president of the e CV. Was asked the other
- 8:13Speaker 1: day what the greatest fear was. One of them was war,
- 8:16Speaker 1: the other one was Mike, how big a fear? Do
- 8:20Speaker 1: you have about mutation And it's our messenger, robyn Ny
- 8:25Speaker 1: claic ascid the best way of dealing with any kind
- 8:30Speaker 1: of mutation that we say, So let me start with
- 8:33Speaker 1: your last question. Yes, MRY is the best technology to
- 8:37Speaker 1: deal with mutation. While because we've shown in January that
- 8:42Speaker 1: it took us forty two days to go from the
- 8:45Speaker 1: sequence published by the Chinese government of the Saskovie two
- 8:48Speaker 1: two shipping to be a ni H human grade quality product,
- 8:54Speaker 1: I think we can take this down to around thirty
- 8:56Speaker 1: days with the things we've learned and the investment we
- 8:59Speaker 1: have made. So if tomorrow there was a new mutation
- 9:03Speaker 1: like the one you mentioned that could have an impact
- 9:06Speaker 1: on the efficacy of vaccine, we could within a month
- 9:09Speaker 1: go back and have a new vaccine. We will not
- 9:12Speaker 1: need to do studies anymore because it's the same chemistry
- 9:16Speaker 1: for the molecular emoney. It's the same manufacturing process. So
- 9:20Speaker 1: if you change out of a message that is very long,
- 9:23Speaker 1: thousands of letters of genetic code of life, if you
- 9:27Speaker 1: change a couple of them for mutation, do not have
- 9:29Speaker 1: to redo clinical studies anymore. So MNEY is clearly the
- 9:33Speaker 1: best adapted for mutation on the one you mentioned. We
- 9:36Speaker 1: are tracking it. We're gonna run the experiment very quickly
- 9:41Speaker 1: to see those the blood that we have from the humans.
- 9:45Speaker 1: We went on phase one and of phase two. Does
- 9:47Speaker 1: it neutralize the new virus. If it does, we know
- 9:51Speaker 1: the vaccine works. Well. If it doesn't, we can quickly
- 9:55Speaker 1: change the sequence and have a new vaccine. Can you
- 9:57Speaker 1: give me some perspective on the side effects. Yes, the
- 10:02Speaker 1: side effects. We've reported the serious side effects in the
- 10:05Speaker 1: press release for Transparent Serison. They are very similar to
- 10:08Speaker 1: what you see with other vaccines. We did not even
- 10:12Speaker 1: report the fever because they were less than two percent
- 10:16Speaker 1: of cases at fever. And what you see is what
- 10:19Speaker 1: you see with commercial vaccine. A bit of pain at
- 10:22Speaker 1: the side of injection, a bit of rensse for their
- 10:24Speaker 1: two both go away with no medication, and that the
- 10:28Speaker 1: systemical values is some people having some fatigue, especially in
- 10:32Speaker 1: the elderly group. You see people having a bit of headache. Again,
- 10:36Speaker 1: those things go away usually within the day or so
- 10:39Speaker 1: with no medication. Of course, people can take a time
- 10:41Speaker 1: all or equivalent and actually not even feel those pains. Sevan,
- 10:47Speaker 1: you mentioned the moment to go about being able to reformulate,
- 10:50Speaker 1: How quickly do you think you'll get into kind of
- 10:53Speaker 1: two point zero three point zero? How quickly do you
- 10:56Speaker 1: think that cycle will happen um and what improved and
- 11:00Speaker 1: do you think you'll be looking for? You mentioned temperature
- 11:02Speaker 1: early on as paying more of the critical factors as
- 11:04Speaker 1: you look for reformulations. What work are you doing and
- 11:07Speaker 1: how improved will be the product and how quickly? Yes,
- 11:11Speaker 1: so that's a great question. I think we're of course
- 11:14Speaker 1: always working on temperature and stability the thirty days when
- 11:18Speaker 1: as today at French semperature is the first step forward.
- 11:21Speaker 1: Because we have that data, we continue to monitor a
- 11:24Speaker 1: product that is own stability in our abs and if
- 11:27Speaker 1: we're able to expand it will do so. The other
- 11:30Speaker 1: piece I think is single those usage. The current product,
- 11:34Speaker 1: like all the other products, is multi dose, so in
- 11:37Speaker 1: every vile you're gonna get ten dozes for ten people.
- 11:41Speaker 1: And the reason the entire industry did that is very
- 11:44Speaker 1: is not enough filling capacity in the world that was
- 11:48Speaker 1: sitting idle to wait for a pandemic, and so by
- 11:51Speaker 1: putting tenders in one vile, we can of course get
- 11:54Speaker 1: much quicker product in the marketplace to vaccinate people. But
- 11:58Speaker 1: if you think about the potential us from the meat
- 12:01Speaker 1: too long term. In term of boosting, it will be
- 12:04Speaker 1: much easier to have a single dose vaccination like you
- 12:06Speaker 1: have when you get a seasonal flu shot stuff. I
- 12:10Speaker 1: found a question from me. As you said at the
- 12:12Speaker 1: beginning of this conversation, you've been working on this for
- 12:14Speaker 1: a long time. You were looking to use messenger RNA
- 12:19Speaker 1: for other therapies. Can you talk to me about the
- 12:22Speaker 1: acceleration you've been through within your business as a result
- 12:26Speaker 1: of COVID nineteen and I'm looking for silver linings here?
- 12:29Speaker 1: Will this help in treatments elsewhere? Will it help with
- 12:32Speaker 1: cancer and other areas? Yes, I'm a place where it's
- 12:37Speaker 1: going to help the most is infectious disease vaccine. We
- 12:41Speaker 1: have six vaccines for over infectious disease that are all
- 12:44Speaker 1: first class, meaning no commercial vaccine available. A good example
- 12:48Speaker 1: is CMB Cito megat of virus. It's a virus that
- 12:51Speaker 1: drives the number one course of birth defect in Europe
- 12:54Speaker 1: or in the US ten thousand kids in the US
- 12:56Speaker 1: per year. No vaccine on the market. The WAD industry
- 13:00Speaker 1: a strike for twenty years to get a CMB vaccine
- 13:02Speaker 1: to work. They all failed well with the positive phase
- 13:05Speaker 1: to study in September, starting the Phase three next year.
- 13:09Speaker 1: That's a two to five billion annual pixel product that
- 13:13Speaker 1: we have not licensed, so meaning it's a product percent
- 13:17Speaker 1: for Moderna, and we have many more like this. We
- 13:19Speaker 1: just announced we're going to get into the flu business.
- 13:22Speaker 1: So what the COVID vaccine has done for Moderna is
- 13:25Speaker 1: one deal is king of a platform for vaccines, which
- 13:28Speaker 1: translated into a lot of value. And two is an
- 13:31Speaker 1: acceleration for us becoming a commercial company. We were supposed
- 13:35Speaker 1: to be commercial in the twenty three to twenty four
- 13:37Speaker 1: time frame, when now it's possible we were being commercial
- 13:40Speaker 1: before the end of the year. That's called an acceleration. Stephan,
- 13:44Speaker 1: thank you very much. In Day. We really appreciate your
- 13:46Speaker 1: time today. Thank you very much in Day sharing it
- 13:48Speaker 1: with us Stephanel the Moderna CEO. That was Stefan ban Cell,
- 13:54Speaker 1: the CEO of Moderna speaking with Bloomberg's Guy Johnson and
- 13:58Speaker 1: Alex Steel, talking about out the study that just came
- 14:01Speaker 1: out about their vaccine. Again, ninety four point five percent efficacy,
- 14:04Speaker 1: very high number, uh, you know, kind of in the
- 14:07Speaker 1: ballpark with what we saw from Fiser last week's We've
- 14:10Speaker 1: got two possible vaccines coming to markets. That's certainly very
- 14:14Speaker 1: positives if we think about this pandemic right now. Let's
- 14:16Speaker 1: get some more details on what this modern vaccine might
- 14:20Speaker 1: look like. We can do that with Bloomberg Intelligence senior
- 14:23Speaker 1: pharmac pharmaceutical analysts. That would be Sam Fizzelli. He joins
- 14:28Speaker 1: us from France. Sam, thanks so much for joining us here. Boy,
- 14:32Speaker 1: this number, the point five percent jumps out of it
- 14:35Speaker 1: just like the number did as well. How do you
- 14:38Speaker 1: compare and contrast um these two potential vaccines? Yeah, high
- 14:44Speaker 1: paul Um. So I think on the efficacy front, we
- 14:47Speaker 1: should currently assume that they're similarly effective, because these are
- 14:52Speaker 1: you know, nine seven percent versus nine point five on
- 14:56Speaker 1: a few cases can go either way as the case
- 15:00Speaker 1: as the crew. So I would call the two vaccines
- 15:03Speaker 1: equivalent in terms of efficacy, at least on the early data.
- 15:06Speaker 1: But then you have all the various other levels. So no,
- 15:10Speaker 1: Darn has done something that Fighter did not. They have
- 15:12Speaker 1: given us a bit more detailed They first they gave
- 15:14Speaker 1: us the statistical power, which is great, and then they
- 15:18Speaker 1: told us about the severe cases none in the vaccinated group.
- 15:23Speaker 1: That's fantastic to see. Um So that's like a protection.
- 15:27Speaker 1: But we're already dealing with the eleven cases, and then
- 15:29Speaker 1: you've got the elderly. And Steven Bontel did not go
- 15:32Speaker 1: into the detail, but if you assume that all the
- 15:35Speaker 1: cases on the vaccine are are older people, which is
- 15:38Speaker 1: very unlikely, then you still have at least a fifty
- 15:42Speaker 1: effective vaccine for older people. And I'm convinced that it
- 15:46Speaker 1: would be better than that. And they did have slightly
- 15:49Speaker 1: better data in elderly than others did, but that's early
- 15:52Speaker 1: phase one too, So everything looks pretty good for this
- 15:55Speaker 1: vaccine and also fights us based on the data that
- 15:58Speaker 1: we have to date. UM. So the m RNA technology
- 16:02Speaker 1: transforms the body's own cells into vaccine making factories. Apparently,
- 16:07Speaker 1: does that mean that when you come in contact with
- 16:09Speaker 1: the coronavirus, it doesn't get into your system and your
- 16:13Speaker 1: your your body doesn't go into sort of overdrive trying
- 16:16Speaker 1: to immunize your own body. So there's two things that
- 16:21Speaker 1: we want a vaccine to do, and we know that
- 16:23Speaker 1: these two vaccines do at least one of them. That is,
- 16:25Speaker 1: they prevent the infection from setting off a massive problem
- 16:29Speaker 1: within a disease within the body, so they limit the
- 16:32Speaker 1: infection and that's great. What we don't know is if
- 16:36Speaker 1: they eliminate the infection or stop the infection taking hold
- 16:39Speaker 1: at all. Therefore that so called sterilizing immunity. Do I do?
- 16:45Speaker 1: I am I still even though I'm vaccinated and don't
- 16:47Speaker 1: have a disease, still at risk of passing the virus
- 16:52Speaker 1: to somebody else or not. That is the thing that
- 16:55Speaker 1: they have to answer, and we still don't know. And
- 16:58Speaker 1: I'm not sure how um Mr bon Cell's answer to
- 17:01Speaker 1: that question actually gets to that point. They need to
- 17:04Speaker 1: look at the virus in the nose, and I don't
- 17:07Speaker 1: think any of the companies have really done that on
- 17:09Speaker 1: a routine weekly basis during their trial. So, Sam, So
- 17:14Speaker 1: we have two vaccines potentially out there. I know there
- 17:17Speaker 1: are more entities out there working at the end of
- 17:20Speaker 1: the day, how many do you think will be commercially
- 17:23Speaker 1: deployed to the market. Oh boy, I mean that's a
- 17:27Speaker 1: that's a tough one. So we look at the early
- 17:29Speaker 1: data for all these vaccines so far, and they all
- 17:31Speaker 1: seem pretty much the same. Maybe the AstraZeneca one is not,
- 17:37Speaker 1: or at least in the early trials didn't quite match
- 17:40Speaker 1: the data that we go for some of these other vaccines.
- 17:43Speaker 1: So time will tell you in the next few weeks
- 17:45Speaker 1: how that does in the UK trial. But I think
- 17:48Speaker 1: the majority of them will be in these sort of ranges.
- 17:51Speaker 1: So you've gotta you know that that creates a conundrum
- 17:54Speaker 1: for people or or a good problem to have. You
- 17:56Speaker 1: have to choose between them, and I don't envy we
- 18:00Speaker 1: ever has to do that. I suppose the reason I
- 18:02Speaker 1: was asking the previous questions samus because I was wondering
- 18:05Speaker 1: about longhoulers or people that you know, get over it,
- 18:09Speaker 1: you know, more quickly, but then develop longer term symptoms.
- 18:13Speaker 1: Do we know if this vaccine protects those kinds of people.
- 18:18Speaker 1: So that's a very interesting question. One is I think
- 18:21Speaker 1: the if the this issue with longhoulders is because they
- 18:25Speaker 1: have a little reservoir somewhere in the guard or systems
- 18:28Speaker 1: somewhere the virus continues to be alive and replicate and
- 18:33Speaker 1: keep couldn't have ac every now and then. If that's
- 18:35Speaker 1: the case, then with the vaccinated situation, you will have
- 18:38Speaker 1: much lower risk of that. But if the problem for
- 18:40Speaker 1: patients is that um, they've got the virus and then
- 18:44Speaker 1: there's other stuff that happens in the body, the immune
- 18:48Speaker 1: system have been going crazy, etcetera, that causes that long
- 18:51Speaker 1: haul issue with that long COVID. Then of course the
- 18:55Speaker 1: vaccine won't help that, except that if you never get
- 18:58Speaker 1: a proper disease from the