November 30

The head of US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer says the company could have a new vaccine for the Omicron variant of the coronavirus in less than 100 days.

Pfizer's CEO Albert Bourla made the remarks in an interview with a US TV network on Monday.

Bourla said if the current coronavirus vaccine protects less, Pfizer needs to create a new vaccine. He noted that the company has already started work for the vaccine.

The CEO also said that Pfizer have already built vaccines for the Beta and Delta variants, but they were not used because the original vaccine remained effective.

He said that a vaccine against Omicron will be used only if the company sees the current one doesn't work.

Bourla also addressed the oral pill that Pfizer is developing to treat COVID-19.

He noted that it was designed with the fact in mind "that most mutations are coming in the spikes or the mechanism of actions that they're having is not related to the spike."

He said that gives him a "very high level of confidence that the treatment will not be affected" by the omicron variant.

NHK