Moderna becomes second company to request emergency FDA authorization for COVID-19 vaccine candidate

Biotech company Moderna applied Monday for an emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration after receiving more good news about the safety and effectiveness of its candidate COVID-19 vaccine. Moderna will be the second vaccine maker to request authorization from the federal government after similarly positive results for Pfizer and its German collaborator BioNTech's candidate vaccine. Moderna's latest findings, according to a company press release, showed that of 196 people in the clinical trial who caught COVID-19, 185 of them had received the placebo, while only 11 received the active vaccine. That works out to an effectiveness rate above 94%.