Pfizer announces two-in-one vaccine for Covid AND flu

Pfizer is testing a new vaccine that inoculates against Covid and flu amid sluggish uptake of both shots.

The first patient was given the two-in-one vaccine this week as clinical trials got underway. In total 180 patients will be recruited for the study.

Pfizer’s new shot targets the Omicron variant and its offshoots as well as four strains of influenza.

Rival vaccine-maker Moderna is also testing a vaccine targeting Covid and flu, as well a triple-shot that also immunizes against RSV.

None are expected to be ready for this year’s flu season, which is already the worst in over a decade piling pressure on hospitals.

Uptake of the updated bivalent booster vaccine is lagging in the US, with just a handful of Americans who are eligible coming forward.

The numbers coming forward for the flu vaccine are also down, with 18 per cent fewer jabbed now than this time last year.

Pfizer cashed in on the Covid pandemic vaccine rush, making $21.98billion in profits last year. Only Novartis — behind many cancer treatments — made more.

The pharma giant is also working on an RSV-fighting jab, which it revealed yesterday was 80 per cent effective in infants.

Pfizer revealed that the first patient was injected in its Phase 1 trials this week.

These tests are to ensure the vaccine is safe and effective and to work out the best dose.

But the new vaccine will need to go through more tests before it can be rolled out nationwide.

The trial will recruit 180 people in the US who are between 18 and 64 years old, who will be followed for six months and compared to a control group who did not get the shot.

All participants are required to have received at least three doses of the Pfizer Covid vaccine, or a primary series plus a booster.

A Pfizer spokesperson told DailyMail.com there were no plans to develop this vaccine to replace the standard two-dose Covid jab.

Annaliesa Anderson, chief scientific officer in vaccine research and development at Pfizer, said mRNA technology was ‘well suited’ to tackling other viruses.

‘Pfizer is deeply proud of our continued work to explore its potential to protect against influenza and Covid in one combination vaccine,’ she said.

‘We think [this] could simplify immunisation practices against these two respiratory pathogens, potentially leading to better vaccine uptake for both diseases.

‘Even with existing seasonal influenza vaccines, the burden of this virus is severe across the world causing thousands of deaths and hospitalisations every year.’

Currently the flu vaccine is rolled out every year to shore up immunity against the virus among those who are more vulnerable.

But scientists expect the Covid shot will also be needed annually, spurring efforts to combine them to avoid the need for two vaccines.

This autumn the US Government began rolling out an updated bivalent booster vaccine, that targets Omicron variants BA.4 and BA.5.

But uptake has been slow with just 22million of the 226million eligible — or 10 per cent — having come forward more than a month into the roll out.

Medics have blamed a general sense of the Covid pandemic being over for the low uptake.

Vaccinations with the flu shot are also lagging with 128million shots distributed so far this year, compared to 156million at this time during the first winter of the pandemic, a drop of 18 per cent.

Yesterday it revealed its experimental RSV vaccine was highly effective, reducing the risk of hospitalization in infants by 80 per cent.