German laboratory BioNTech and pharmaceutical company Pfizer have announced that they are already working on some changes to their covid-19 vaccine to specifically combat the omicron variant, assuming that the current vaccine may not be effective enough to combat the new mutation.

A BionTech/Pfizer official said that the first results of these studies should be known in the next two weeks (15 days) at the earliest. It is these first findings that will determine the effectiveness of the current vaccine against the omicron variant.

"We immediately started studies on variant B.1.1.529, which clearly differs from the variants already known" since the mutations (about 30,000) occur "in the spike protein characteristic of the Sars-Cov-2 virus," the head of the laboratory and pharmaceutical company advanced.

Nothing to admire about BionTech/Pfizer's speed in creating a vaccine for the omicron variant. In fact, BionTech/Pfizer had already been preparing for several months to deliver results for a new vaccine within a hundred days, "in the event of the emergence of a new resistant variant."

Other pharmaceutical companies are also working on vaccines against the omicron variant. For example, Moderna has announced that it may take months to commercially distribute an immunizer adapted for the new covid-19 virus mutations, should the need arise. However, it also expects results of the efficacy of the current vaccines in the next few days.

Janssen, the pharmaceutical arm of Johnson & Johnson, is also evaluating the effectiveness of its vaccine against the new variant. Unlike the other two, this company is working to produce a variant-specific immunizer.

Finally, the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca is evaluating the effectiveness of its existing immunizer against covid-19. The studies are taking place in Botswana and eSwatini, where some cases of the variant have been identified.