Merck's new antiviral molnupiravir (Quality Stock Arts / Shutterstock)

As Omi­cron spread looms, oral an­tivi­rals ap­pear to be one of the best de­fens­es — now we just need more

Af­ter South African sci­en­tists re­port­ed a new Covid-19 vari­ant — dubbed Omi­cron by the WHO — sci­en­tists be­came con­cerned about how ef­fec­tive vac­cines and mon­o­clon­al an­ti­bod­ies might be against it, which has more than 30 mu­ta­tions in the spike pro­tein.

“I think it is su­per wor­ri­some,” Dart­mouth pro­fes­sor and Ada­gio co-founder and CEO Till­man Gern­gross told End­points News this week­end. Mod­er­na CEO Stéphane Ban­cel echoed sim­i­lar con­cerns, telling the Fi­nan­cial Times that ex­perts warned him, “This is not go­ing to be good.”

Endpoints News

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