Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson announced Monday that they, like their competitor “Moderna”, have begun work on a new version of their anti-Covid-19 vaccines targeting the “Omicron” mutant in the event that their vaccines are not effective in protecting against this copy. new virus.

“There is still a lot of uncertainty about the new mutant that was detected in South Africa,” Albert Burla, president of Pfizer, said in an interview with CNBC.

He added, “We will know the most important thing that we need to know within a few weeks,” noting that experiments must be carried out to test the effectiveness of the current vaccine developed by his company in cooperation with the “Biontech” company.

He explained, “If it turns out that the current vaccine is less effective and we need to develop a new vaccine, we started working on it on Friday. We have done the first DNA model, and it will be the first stage in developing a new vaccine,” according to “AFP.”

Burla stressed that, if the need arises, “we will have a vaccine within 95 days.”

He stressed that his company has the capacity, when needed, to produce four billion doses next year.

Borla noted that he is “very confident” of the currently distributed vaccine, “because we were able to reach the good mixture from the beginning.”

Regarding the anti-Covid-19 drug, Borla said that the tablet developed by “Pfizer” to treat the disease and showed an efficacy of 89 percent to avoid hospitalization or death during clinical trials, “was developed with the idea that mutants of the virus may appear.”

And he stated: “I am very, very confident in the drug’s ability to confront all the mutant, including the Omicron mutant.”

He continued, “We must remember that the situation is different when you have treatment that allows a decrease in the proportion of people infected with Covid-19 who are hospitalized from ten to only one person.”

And “Pfizer” previously created two new versions of its vaccine to counter the “delta” and “beta” mutants, but they were not used.

In turn, the company “Moderna” revealed on Friday its intention to develop a booster dose of the vaccine intended to protect against the mutated “Omicron”.

As for Johnson & Johnson, it announced that it is “in the process of evaluating the effectiveness of its vaccine against Covid-19 against mutant mutants, including Omicron.”

The company added in a statement that it is simultaneously working on the production of “a vaccine that specifically targets Omicron, and will develop it as appropriate.”

The statement quoted Mathai Mamin, who is responsible for research at Johnson & Johnson’s “Janssen” company, which developed the vaccine against Covid-19, as saying that the company “remains confident” of the ability of its current single-dose vaccine to provide an immune response against various variables.

But Mamen stressed at the same time that Johnson & Johnson can “quickly” begin conducting clinical trials on the new version of the vaccine if necessary.