Canada getting 168K Moderna vaccine doses before year end

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday that Cana is contracted to receive up to 168,000 doses of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine before end of December, pending approval by Cana’s health regulator.

Trudeau said deliveries could begin within 48 hours of regulatory approval and health officials said y expect to approve use of Moderna vaccine soon.

Canians began receiving vaccine shots developed by Pfizer and BioNTech on Monday and Trudeau said Cana expects to receive about 200,000 doses from Pfizer next week. Cana received an initial batch of 30,000 this week.

Trudeau said y will have 70 sites rey to minister se doses next week, up from 14 sites this week.

U.S. Food and Drug ministration said its preliminary analysis confirmed effectiveness and safety of vaccine developed by Moderna and National Institutes of Health, bringing it to cusp of U.S. authorization. A panel of outside U.S. experts is expected to vote to recommend vaccine on Thursday, with a final FDA decision coming soon reafter.

Moderna’s vaccine is same as Pfizer’s, me with same techlogy. In scrutinizing early results of a 30,000-person study, FDA found it also worked just about same.

Moderna vaccine was more than 94% effective overall at preventing COVID-19 illness, and 86% effective in people 65 and older. FDA uncovered major safety issues.