Vaccine experts say Moderna's Covid-19 data leave big questions:
Heavy
hearts soared Monday with news that Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate
— the frontrunner in the American market — seemed to be
generating an immune response in Phase 1 trial subjects. The company’s
stock valuation also surged, hitting $29 billion, an astonishing feat for a company that currently sells zero products.
But was there good reason for so much enthusiasm? Several vaccine
experts asked by STAT concluded that, based on the information made
available by the Cambridge, Mass.-based company, there’s really no way
to know how impressive — or not — the vaccine may be.
While Moderna blitzed the media, it revealed very little information
— and most of what it did disclose were words, not data. That’s
important: If you ask scientists to read a journal article, they will
scour data tables, not corporate statements. With science, numbers speak
much louder than words.
