Mer­ck stokes pneu­mo­coc­cal ri­val­ry with Pfiz­er, re­veal­ing up­dat­ed 21-va­lent vac­cine da­ta

Mer­ck’s ex­per­i­men­tal 21-va­lent pneu­mo­coc­cal vac­cine best­ed Pfiz­er’s Pre­vnar 20 for 10 of 11 serotypes unique to the new shot, ac­cord­ing to a Tues­day da­ta read­out.

The up­date marks the lat­est move in a years­long com­pe­ti­tion be­tween the ri­vals. Pfiz­er cel­e­brat­ed an ap­proval for its 20-va­lent shot in 2021, beat­ing Mer­ck’s 15-va­lent Vaxneu­vance to the punch a month be­fore its de­ci­sion date. Mer­ck has been work­ing on a 21-va­lent com­peti­tor de­signed specif­i­cal­ly for adults, and Mer­ck’s US Hu­man Health pres­i­dent Jan­nie Oost­huizen said at a UBS con­fer­ence ear­li­er this month that they hope to sub­mit a fil­ing by the end of this year, ac­cord­ing to an Al­phaSense tran­script.

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