US vaccine stocks rose sharply on Wednesday.
The Zhitong Finance App learned that US vaccine stocks rose sharply on Wednesday. Earlier, it was reported that Australia reported the first case of human infection with bird flu, and the United States also confirmed the second case of human infection with bird flu.
CureVAC (CVAC.US) closed up nearly 19% on Wednesday. The company collaborated with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.US) to develop a first-stage avian influenza (H5N1) vaccine.
Moderna (MRNA.US) closed up about 14%, the biggest one-day increase since 2022. The company said that one of its vaccines is in the second phase of development. The target virus belongs to the same family as the current outbreak of the avian influenza virus.
BioNTech (BNTX.US) closed up about 11%. Although the German company has yet to develop a vaccine against bird flu, its experience with the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine means that it is likely that it will soon develop an avian influenza vaccine.
The stock price of Novavax Pharmaceuticals (NVAX.US), which focuses on vaccines, rose about 5%, and the stock price of PFE.US (PFE.US), which collaborated with BioNTech to develop the COVID-19 vaccine, also rose by about 4%.
Although the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that the risk of human infection with avian influenza is still very low, the agency said that two H5N1 vaccine candidate viruses “have been provided to manufacturers and can be used to make vaccines if needed.”
In April of this year, a senior US Department of Health and Human Services official said that if bird flu breaks out, the US federal government may ship 100 million doses of the bird flu vaccine within three to four months. However, considering that a person needs 2 doses to receive full protection, 100 million doses can only protect 50 million people.