The Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation and the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF, Russia's sovereign wealth fund) announce that The Lancet, one of the world's oldest and most respected medical journals, has published interim results of a Phase III clinical trial of Sputnik V, confirming the vaccine's high efficacy and safety. Sputnik V, which is based on a well-studied human adenoviral vectors platform, is the world's first registered vaccine against coronavirus.

In a joint press briefing today together with German Health Minister Jens Spahn, Minister-President of North Rhine-Westphalia, Armin Laschet, and Chief Executive Officer of CureVac N.V., Franz-Werner Haas, Member of the Board of Management, Bayer AG and President of the Bayer’s Pharmaceuticals Division, Stefan Oelrich, made the following statement:

AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine has been recommended for conditional marketing authorisation (CMA) in the European Union (EU) for active immunisation to prevent COVID-19 caused by SARS-CoV-2, in individuals 18 years of age and older.

Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and BioNTech SE (Nasdaq: BNTX) announced results from in vitro neutralization studies of sera from individuals vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. The sera neutralized SARS-CoV-2 with key mutations present in the United Kingdom (U.K.) and South Africa variants, as measured by studies conducted by Pfizer and the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB).

Valneva SE, a specialty vaccine company focused on prevention of infectious diseases with significant unmet medical need, today announced it has commenced production of its inactivated, adjuvanted COVID-19 vaccine candidate in parallel to the ongoing clinical studies, in order to optimize the timeline for potential deliveries of the vaccine. The Phase 1/2 clinical study is now fully enrolled and is expected to report initial results in April 2021.

Sanofi and BioNTech have today entered into an agreement under which Sanofi will support manufacturing and supply of BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine which is being co-developed with Pfizer.

Sanofi will provide BioNTech access to its established infrastructure and expertise to produce over 125 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine in Europe. Initial supplies will originate from Sanofi's production facilities in Frankfurt from summer of 2021.

Merck (NYSE: MRK), known as MSD outside the United States and Canada, today announced that the company is discontinuing development of its SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 vaccine candidates, V590 and V591, and plans to focus its SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 research strategy and production capabilities on advancing two therapeutic candidates, MK-4482 and MK-7110.